Evolved Scion
by Arthur Hansen
Summary: Sometimes finding new friends is just from being at the wrong place at the wrong time.
1. Evolved Scion I  Abandoned to Hope

**Chapter 1: Unexpected Strategic Complications**

The young girl looked older than she was. At five foot five inches, she was very tall for her age of eleven, but fit in as only average here at the Bayville High school football game. She was sitting down at the end of the field near a closed snack bar, looking for this 'destined event' that she had been sent to this place by her mother.

She was not even sure how she had been transported here, which was adding up to the fact that she may have been sent on a wild goose chase so that she could not interfere for her own safety. The fact that she had been given one of Zeus's lightning bolts, along with a few other Relics had her worried. She tapped the bracelet on her belt, wondering at it. It seemed unusual, but Hades and Poseidon had promise her that it would protect her.

It was the shouting under the bleachers that she barely heard over the roar of the students. Some of the jocks appeared to be beating up a spindly, ugly kid and another older teen had stepped in. While she was not adverse to interfering with the fight, it did not look... serious!

The bolt of red lightning knocked out one of the football player (that a part of her mind noted was the quarterback of the team) and then tore a furrow and hit the building right next to her. It shattered bricks, wiring and a propane tank. She felt blistering heat before chilling water sheathed her body for just a second.

And then she knew no more.

* * *

"I'm sorry, professor," Scott Summer said as he set his ruby-quartz gaze down towards the ground.

Professor Xavier accepted that. "You were just attempting to help, though you should always be mindful of your powers. Sadly, it looks like two of the students were injured. Duncan should pull through, thanks to his helmet, but there is a girl who was right next to the propane tank." He sighed at the delay in getting to the train station. "The sheriff now thinks that she might have been playing with fire there."

"Is there anything we can do?" Jean Gray asked.

"Not right now. I'll stay here a few minutes to nudge things to make people forget your involvement." Professor Xavier nudged a few thoughts, but for the most part and in their own minds, they thought it was just a juvenile prank.

Duncan was already confused and had lost his short-term memories of the event. The sheriff was suspicious for a bit and thought to call in the forensics team, but a not-so subtle nudge had him worry more about the fire and the injured. A cursory scan of Duncan's mind showed his injured brain, so he was loathe to mess with it.

His next scan took him to the blonde girl that had been found at nearly ground zero. Her mind was blank from a deep coma as the paramedics taped wounds closed on her head and back. He dared not mess with an injured person's mind.

With a sigh, he rolled up the window of his car. "Ororo, we should get to the train station. We are late for picking up our newest student." He would have to visit the girl later.

"Of course, sir." The white-haired African-American nodded as she put the car in drive.

* * *

Scott Summers had not been able to get the girl he had injured out of his head. He felt he had to at least apologize, even if he couldn't explain why he was sorry. So early that morning, he drove to the hospital in his small red and white sportscar. Walking into the main entrance, he looked around and then stood in front of the nearly empty nurse's station.

"Um, excuse me ma'am? I understand there was a girl brought here from that explosion at the Bayville Highschool game?" the brown-haired teen asked, his eyes hidden behind his ruby-red glasses.

"Our Jane Doe? Do you know her?" Nurse McGilligan asked eagerly.

Scott's mouth dropped open. "What? Um, no. I just saw her there and that she got hurt," he explained quickly.

"Ah, that's sad. Though the police do want to ask her some questions, but she unconscious right now. Though her wounds are healing very rapidly. It's a miracle," the nurse said, clasping her hand around her crucifix on a necklace.

"Oh, um, really? Well, do you mind if I make a phone call?" Scott asked inanely.

Thirty minutes later, Professor Xavier was rolled in by Ororo Monroe and Logan, all hurriedly dressed in business dress.

"Professor!" Scott called out as he walked over from the waiting area. "I've been hearing even more things since I called you."

"Oh? I take it our young Jane Doe is a bit different?" the bald man asked from his wheelchair.

"Yeah, you could say that. I guess they tried to draw some blood this morning, just in case. They broke the needle on her skin," he whispered excitedly. "Do you think she is a mutant?"

"Chuck, she's here," Logan called out. "Him, at the door." His nostrils were flared out, sniffing heavily.

"Ah, Mystique, how pleasant," Professor X called out from near the nurses station.

The blond haired man with a mustache frowned. "Charles. Your sources of information are very good. But once I've talked to her, I'm sure this girl will join our Brotherhood."

"I'm afraid neither of us are going to talk to her right now. She's currently unconscious in a coma," the bald telepath explained.

The stranger snarled. "Fine. Don't think this is over." He turned and stomped back out in a fit.

Xavier shook his head, even as Ororo looked down at him in curiousity. "What are you going to do, Professor?"

"I'm not sure quite yet," he admitted.

The double-swinging door that kept the waiting room partitioned off from the patients slammed open. A big black man turned back to another nurse. "I won't come back until that freak is gone, Judy."

"Rudy! Try to be reasonable. She injured and no one has filed a missing person's report for her," an older woman called out.

"I'll sue if you try to force me back to work around that _thing_. It can't be safe." With that, the nurse named Rudy turned and walked off.

In the waiting room, the family and some patients waiting for help started to talk.

"Judy Oliver? My name is Professor Xavier," the bald man said as he wheeled up. "I run the Xaviers Institute for Gifted Children. I would like to offer my assistance and perhaps help you with your problem."

The nursing administrator looked confused, but nodded carefully.

* * *

Blue-green eyes blinked open as she was slid carefully into a bed. "Uhn?" she mumbled.

"Professor Xavier, she's waking up," the red-head called as she finished using her telekinesis to slide the girl into the bed. "Hello, my name is Jean Gray."

"Hi?" she replied back in confusion as she took in the room.

"You've been injured, but you seem to be recovering. Do you need anything?" Jean asked as the professor and Ororo entered. "This is Professor Xavier and Mrs. Monroe, the faculty here at Xaviers Institute for the Gifted."

"Bathroom," the girl replied muzzily. She slipped out of the bed and let herself be guided to the bathroom.

Professor X watched them leave the room to go to the hall where the bathroom lay. "Remarkable. Only a few hours and already back on her feet. And her wounds have already started scarring over."

"She was very steady on her feet, too," the weather manipulator noted.

Jean guided her back a few minutes later. "It would probably be better for you to stay awake for a bit. So your name is Sheila?"

Sitting on the edge of the bed in shorts and a T-shirt the girl looked at them in confusion. "It is?"

"They said your memory might be confused for a while. So it is nothing to be worried about," Ororo explained in a soothing tone as she looked through some of the papers that Judy Oliver had written them up. "The nurse Judy Oliver said she would stop by and do a check up on her way home."

"Okay. My head hurts, if that helps," Sheila explained while examining everyone in the room.

"Are you up to taking these pain relievers? You were involved in an accident and sustained a head injury and some cuts on your back, but they are supposed to be healing well," Xaviers said with a warm smile. "The nurses were wondering how you got hurt if you are so tough. They could not even stitch you up."

"Huh?" she looked totally confused at the comment while dry swallowing the pain pills.

"Well, we can go over it later," Jean said to interrupt the girl getting upset.

All three of them left the girl to rest in bed, the drone of the TV keeping her awake and conscious.

"Nothing, professor?" Jean asked. "All I feel from her is some confusion." They were walking (or rolling in the professor's case) towards his office.

"No, whatever happened to hurt her scrambled her memories quite severely. She really didn't recognize that name as her own." He rolled behind his desk, leaning forward in thought. "We shall just have to see how she heals and I may contract a specialist if needed."

* * *

Other than an intruder that made a racket, it was a quiet few days. Sheila was actually able to get up and visit the bathroom after a few days, much to the delight of the staff and students. On the fifth day, she woke up feeling much better. The wounds on her back only bothered her a bit, but she actually felt good enough to go for a walk and to go clean up herself in the bathroom

"Why, hello!" a blue-furred boy said as he opened the door to the upstairs bathroom. "You were the girl that was hurt. I'm Kurt!"

"I'm... Sheila, I think. Accent?" she asked curiously.

"Ja! I am German," he said while point his thumb at his chest.

"Wunderbar! Ich kann meine die praxis aussprache anzuhören," she replied brightly.

"Ihnen sprechen deutsche? That is... AWESOME!" the teleporter declared. "You have a bad American accent though."

Scott Summers climbed up the stairs to see Kurt and the blonde-haired girl. "Uh, hi."

"Hello! I just found out I speak German," she said in a happy tone.

"That's really good, I suppose. Breakfast is served," he replied awkwardly.

Sheila smiled at Jean and Ororo at the table, then looked at the brutish looking Logan in confusion. "Hello."

"Sheila, huh? I heard you don't remember much," he asked gruffly.

She was busy chewing a forkful of pancakes. "Umhm."

Professor X rolled into the dining room. "Scott, it's time for you three to head to school. Sheila, how are you feeling?"

Scott led Kurt and Jean out, all of them waving goodbye as they walked to the garage.

"Still quite a bit of pain," she admitted. "But I'd like to get out and at least go for a walk. Then maybe find something to read."

"A lot of people would still be in bed with those sort of wounds," Ororo reminded her. "As it is, Judy actually thinks you will be recovered in a week or so."

"Great!" she said crabbily as her back ached. "I wish my powers had saved me from getting hurt before the accident."

That got a chuckle out of all three. "Why don't we go down to the Danger Room?" Professor X suggested. "We can use it in workout mode."

* * *

Sheila looked around the circular room. The flat metal floor looked uncomfortable.

Up in the central control room up above, Professor X manipulated the computerized controls to have a weight lifting bench appear. The lifting bar was attached to the ground with a hydraulic system. "I've noticed you seem a little stronger than normal. Let's see how much you can lift," he said over a speaker system.

With a shrug, the young girl sat on the bench and lifted the bar easily. Then she lifted it with one hand. "Yeah, I think you are right. Can we increase the weights?"

"Just keeping lifting and we'll slowly increase it," Ororo promised. "But do tell us if you feel any real pain."

Logan was studying the girl as she slowly did a set of reps with the slowly increasing weights. "She's got some athletic training," he noted.

"Interesting. So perhaps we could narrow our search to missing athletes?" the African-American woman asked.

"Five hundred pounds? That girl can't weigh one hundred pounds sopping weight," the Canadian said incredulously.

"She's not showing any strain yet," Professor X noted as he slowly increased it again.

At eight hundred pounds, Sheila stopped lifting. "I think that is getting close to hurting me," she admitted. "How did I do?"

"Great, kid. We'll have to do this again when you are feeling better," Logan called out. "How about jog around the track. Just don't push yourself too hard."

"Right!" she called back. She took off at a jog, building up her speed. She was soon running at a respectable rate.

"That's good, Sheila. We don't want you hurting yourself." Xavier noted that she was not quite at Olympic level of running. Of course, she was still injured. "How about a long jump?"

"Sure!" she replied as she bunched her leg muscles. With a mighty leap, she flung herself across the room in a single bound over fifty feet away. "Whoa! That was neat."

"Lots of things here aren't adding up, Chuck," Logan said with a disgruntled look on his craggy features.

"Sheila, I think it's time to stop. Did you hurt your back again?" Ororo called out across the overhead.

"A little, sorry."

"Logan, she is just a young woman that needs our help. We must do everything to find her family. After that, if she wants, she can stay here at the school," Xavier said to his old friend.

"I guess."

* * *

Sheila was reading a book in her bed two days later, very bored out of her mind. "Are you sure there isn't something I can do?"

"Not until you are fully healed," Jean said. Behind her and leaning up against a wall, Scott stood silently. She removed the bandage from Sheila's forehead. "That's barely a scar. I've heard that Logan is like that, but you are the first mutant I've seen do it."

"Any, uh, luck with your memory?" the teen boy asked. Guilt was still gnawing at his heart.

"No, sorry. I have been reading up on it. Everything I've read seems to think I should put myself in a familiar environment. I wonder if I could go to school like you. Staying here at the mansion is boring," she admitted.

"That's probably an excellent idea. I'll have Storm take you to Bayville High for a placement test, even if it is just for a little while," Professor X said at the doorway. "Let me make some calls."

The next morning, Sheila was nearly dancing in readiness. She was in some clothes that Jean had outgrown, but had added the the owl necklace and strange armband adorned with tridents and skulls that had a glass bulb in the center. "Come on, Scott! Kurt, we are going to be late!"

The drive to school was quick and the young blonde spent the morning taking tests.

Scott looked up as the door to his math class opened up. Sheila stuck her head in. "Hi. You are Mr. Thomasia, right?" she asked the old man.

"Yes?" he asked, not looking too thrilled.

"I just got admitted to class here a Bayville today," she said with a grin. She quickly took a seat, ready to stimulate her brain.

Ten minutes later, she wanted to scream her head off. This was... _boring._

* * *

Todd Tolansky looked at the new girl that was talking to Scott Summers. "Hey, Scott," the slightly deformed boy called out.

"That smell is you?" the girl asked. "Did you fall in something?"

"Hey, it's a skin condition," he snapped back.

"Todd, how is it? Decided against breaking into the mansion?" the brown-haired boy.

"She staying at your place then?" Todd asked carefully. Mystique wanted some more information about the girl.

"Yes," she replied. "Oh, there's Jean and Kurt. Hungry again?" She directed this comment to the hologram-covered boy.

"Ja! I'm always so hungry," he said with a happy smile.

"What's your mutant stitch? Or is it just a hitch?" the Toad asked in his nasal way.

"Um, I'm strong, jump and I can't be hurt now. Though I'm not supposed to depend on it, in case it is something that turns itself off and back on."

"Well, you can't jump better than the Toad!" Todd boasted while pointing at himself with his thumb.

"Why not?"

That actually got Kurt laughing a lot. "That is so funny! Why don't ve go to the track and have you race?"

"We could use the Danger Room," Scott supplied helpfully.

"No way, yo. Not going into that freaking death trap, nope." Todd looked very upset. "Nearly getting killed by that place once was enough."

Five minutes later, they were at the football field, which also had a track racing track round it. Toad actually bounced along in thirty foot hops. Scott looked around, not seeing anyone so it was clear.

"All right," Jean called out. "Start!" She dropped her hand like a starter's flag.

Todd immediately leaped forward in three quick hops. "I'm going to win this!"

So he was quite surprised when Sheila leaped to land next to him in one hop. "Ribbit!" she cat-called.

"Hey, that's my thing you are being," Todd complained as he valiantly tried to keep up. Pushing himself, he was still slowly losing ground. In desperation, he lashed out with his tongue and tripped her heavily

"Oooph! Hey! You attacked me!" the girl said as she spat a couple pieces of gravel from the track.

"Hey yo, I'm going to win this!" Todd shouted as he continued on down the track.

With a growl, she pushed herself back up and then leaped forward, almost catching up with him.

"Dammit, got to slam it!" the boy shouted, pushing himself even harder.

They both leaped past Jean and the boys, so close that they really couldn't tell which was first.

"That was actually fun," Sheila said with a laugh. "Ribbit!"

Todd's mouth dropped as he realized that the other mutants were laughing _with_ him, not at him. "Yo, that's still my thing!"

"Well, as much fun as it was, we really do have to get back to the Institute," Scott called out. "See you around, Todd?"

"Sure, man!"

As the kids departed, a woman stepped out of the shadows. She had almost interrupted them, but wanted to see what they were up to. Nothing but a small bit competition. The new girl was able to leap quite far, but it was not quite as natural of a movement, if that made sense. All strength, essentially.

"What are you up to, Xavier?" the dark-blue mutant asked.

* * *

**Chapter 2: Instincts and Impulses**

It had been a quiet few days. Sheila was starting to get a few flashes of coherent memory. She was able to confirm that her name was actually Sheila Henderson (like they had found sewn on her clothes) and small things like her mother's name, which was Athena. But progress had been slow. She could not remember her home, though she thought it was near Chicago.

Currently she was in a Danger Room session with Jean, Scott and Kurt.

"How does she make that look easy?" Jean Gray complained as she deflected some saws that had been flung at her.

'She' was Sheila, who had just taken it as a challenge to flip, spin and roll under or over the attacks at her instead of depending on her invulnerability. She was more than happy, as it really let her stretch and run fast.

"Look out, Nightcrawler!" Cyclops called out.

Jean Gray reacted instantly, pushing him right out of the way of a large cannon even as Sheila's speed double, allowing her to blur over there and try to grab him out of the way.

"Good reaction time," Wolverine called out from the control room. "Sheila, you really moved there. That was easily twice as fast as your top speed."

"She was already breaking Olympic records," Cyclops said as he blasted out with his optic shot, breaking another cannon.

"But ju you have advmit that zhe did not get any cool powers like teleporting," Nightcrawler called out as he ported behind an attacking cannon. "Or optic blasts or even telekenisis!"

Cyclops gave them a tight smile. "True, but even without something flashy, she is keeping up perfectly fine."

"I think I'm happy not being 'flashy'," she grumbled, giving lie to that fact. She would love to be able to do something cool and flashy.

"I would take being invulnerable. These Danger Room sessions always leave me bruised and sore," Jean complained as she blocked several mechanical arms from smacking her down.

Up in the control room, Professor X and Ororo entered from the elevator. "Logan, how goes it?"

"Not too bad. Elf nearly messed up, but his team mates were there for him," the short, muscular man said. "But I get the feeling that ain't why you are here."

"Yes, you are right. I need to talk to Sheila before they head off to school." Xavier looked uncommonly serious.

Logan picked up on that tone. "We're just about done anyways." He walked back to the control panel and hit the cancel switch. "X-Men, hit the showers. Sheila, the professor would like to talk to you before you head out to school."

She showed up at the professor's office. "Professor?" she asked.

"Ah, yes. Come in and sit down." The bald man looked up from his paperwork. "Unfortunately, I haven't been able to track down your family in Illinois. Can you remember anything more that would help us?"

"I... think I was raised by Erwin and Lisa Henderson. I've got a younger brother named Anton. But they are my adopted parents?" Sheila sounded a bit confused.

"I thought you said your mother was named Athena," Xavier asked with a frown on his face. "I've checked the entire list of missing children for Illinois, Wisconsin and the surrounding states without coming across your picture."

"I think my mother had me raised by the Hendersons." Her forehead was beaded in sweat as she thought hard.

"Ah. Do you remember her last name?" He grabbed a pen.

"She doesn't have one. I don't know why I'm that positive of that fact, but I am." Her mind was confused as she realized that Athena had more names, but those were not last names, but names out of books. Mythological names.

But that _should _be impossible.

"Hmm. Well, as your temporary guardian, I received your placement exam paperwork. They think you should just get caught up this year in high school, but recommend that you be placed in pre-college classes. It seems you caught a few people's attention with your math and science scores." Professor Xavier smiled at that. "You other scores were very high, but you missed enough that you should definitely fit into a normal class."

She frowned at that, too. She must have really flubbed those tests. That... irked her a lot.

* * *

Scott, Kurt and Sheila were returning to the Institute after school without Jean, as she had been asked by the professor to help approach a new potential mutant in Illinois. It was as they were walking to the main building that they heard a bassy roar of a motorcycle taking off with a peal of burning rubber.

"Whoa! Iz that Wolverine?" Kurt asked as the masked mutant drove off like a maniac. He still had his hologram on.

"It was," Sheila confirmed.

"Well, you want to see where he was off to in such a rush?" the red-glasses wearing teen asked with a grin. He suddenly took off back to the garage where he headed to a rounded, red, open-top sportscar with white racing stripes over the hood and trunk.

"Not the X-Van?" Kurt asked pointing at the big, black and heavily armored vehicle.

Scott hopped into the driver's side and shook his head. "This is lower profile."

"Well, it is shorter at least," the blonde-haired girl said as she landed in the passenger side.

"Where will I sit?" the teleporting mutant asked.

Sheila gave him a grin. "You can sit on my lap. It's not like you can hurt me, you know!"

The red coupe spun out, heading into town and following the motorcycle into town.

"He went left on Parker Street," Sheila said helpfully about ten minutes later.

"Thanks," Scott replied as he followed.

"We lost him," Kut complained as he shifted uncomfortably. The girl's lap was uncomfortable.

Sheila was listening as she looked around. She closed her eyes for a long second as she heard a motorcycle cut off. "He went into that parking garage."

Scott's eyes widened at that as he looked at his passenger through ruby-quartz in surprise. "How do you know that?"

"The motorcycle's engine is echoing around in there. We could probably just wait down here," she noted as the coupe was pulled into a street parking spot.

"Ooh! Escape from discomfort!" Kurt exclaimed as he hopped off her lap and rubbed his buttocks. He started walking up and down the sidewalk.

The older male teen just chuckled at the teleporter's antics. So he was quite surprised when Sheila suddenly pushed him hard, sending him skidding onto the ground.

With a crash, Logan's motorcycle landed on the sports coupe... and Sheila!

"Hey!" she yelled out as she lifted the motorcycle off her head. "That could have killed someone." The only sign of injury was her ripped sleeve on her T-shirt.

"Um, nice save there, Sheila. But it's showtime," Scott said as he slipped on his visor and half-hood.

Just a minute later, the three of them made it to the grudge fight between the shorter Wolverine and another animalistic mutant wearing a trenchcoat. The bigger mutant had Wolverine pinned to a concrete support pillar with a sedan.

Cyclops blasted Sabertooth away, bouncing him off a van to free Wolverine. "The X-Men got your back, Wolverine! Nightcrawler! Aegis! Go!"

Sheila, know known as Aegis in her black and white outfit, charged right behind the teleporter, who had bounced off the huge mutant's chest. "Hey, who put the wall there!" the blue-furred mutant complained lamely.

"Kya!" Aegis shouted as she put her full force into a punch into stomach. It felt like hitting a tree.

"A little spitfire, ain't ya?" the blond giant asked as he slashed out, missing the lithe girl.

Wolverine was pissed as hell by the three kids interfering with his man to man fight and decided to take it out on Sabertooth. "Rawhr!" he screamed as he tackled him.

They slid across the concrete ground of the parking garage and into an elevator. Wolverine extended his claws with two metal shings, but was kicked back out of the elevator before he could chop up Sabertooth. The elevator dinged and started to go down.

In a near frenzy, Wolverine started slicing up the door. "Sabertooth!" he yelled down the elevator shaft.

"This is just the beginning taste of our feud," Sabertooth shouted back.

"Coming through!" Aegis called out she dived down the shaft.

Sabertooth was just exiting the elevator when the blonde girl smashed right through the access hatch of the elevator roof. "Going somewhere?"

"You are gutsy," the huge mutant admitted. "But you should have let me pull back. This fight is between the runt and I." His clawed hand snatched out very fast, grabbing her by the neck. "Now its going to cost you."

"Um, nope." She kicked both feet into his stomach, hard. "I'm called Aegis for a reason. They haven't figured out something that can hurt me."

Sabertooth tried to squeeze her neck harder to get a reaction and all she did was kick his face, knocking a tooth loose.

That was when a bolt of red energy smashed into him again even as Wolverine threw himself at the much larger man "This is my fight, kids. Stay out."

"Good job teleporting us, Nightcrawler," Cyclops called out, even as they both ducked their female teammate that got tossed at them and through a concrete wall.

"Man that's tough on my outfit," Aegis complained as she pushed a large piece of concrete off of her and then leaped back to her feet. "Guess we'll watch them?"

"Whvat?" Nightcrawler asked.

"No, she's right. We'll back him up if it gets too hairy, but its his fight," the brown-haired teen concurred, narrowing his eyes behind his visors.

They watched the fight for another five minutes as they ripped into each other with the ferocity of wild animals before they heard police sirens in the distance.

"Next time, runt. And don't bring your cubs," the bigger mutant said even as his mutant healing factor cured the brusing and cuts on his face.

"I'll send you packing next time, too," Wolverine promised through the ruins of his mask.

The shorter mutant walked over. "At least you had the good sense to leave the fight mostly to me. But listen closely, brats. I don't fight your fights, you don't fight mine. Got it?"

"Aye aye, Kapitän!" Nightcrawler said with a jaunty salute.

"Nightcrawler, you probably better teleport Cyclops out of here before the police arrive. I'll just do a roof-run," Aegis said with a grin.

"What about him?" the blue mutant asked, pointing his large thumb at Wolverine.

"If he wants help, I'm sure he'll ask. But I get the feeling he can handle this situation on his own," the older teen said to the newer members of the X-Men.

"You got that right, kids. Now get out of here," the surly Canadian grumbled. He turned and slunk off into a shadow.

With a bamph of sulpher, Nightcrawler and Cyclops disappeared on their way back to the mansion in several long hops. The last member of the X-Men took off at a sprint, running to the roof of the parking garage and ten leaping over seventy-five feet to the next building.

The police, when they arrived were a bit dumbfounded about the utter carnage that they found and the reports of savage animals attacking each other.

* * *

"Whoa, you are blue!" Kitty Pride exclaimed in a preppy tone.

"Ja, I am!" Kurt said, hiding his hurt feeling behind a go lucky facade.

"That's pretty cool, actually," the new girl said with a warm smile. "Do you have a power, too?"

With that, he poofed up to the top of a chandelier near the ceiling of the main entrance. "I can teleport!"

"So we always ask Kurt to dust that?" Sheila asked Scott.

"Sounds like a good idea," he replied with a grin.

"Hey!"

"What about you two? I know Jean can do the telekinesis thing and the mind-reading thing," the shortest girl asked of them.

"I have an uncontrolled mutation of concussion blasts from my eyes," Scott explained. "Hence the shades."

"And you? Other than being skinny enough for the both of us," Kitty asked.

"A lot of physical bonuses. Strong, fast, invulnerable-" she started to explain.

"Oh, please oh please don't say you have heat vision and flight. That would be way to close to that comic book character from that DC company." Kitty had a wide smile on her face as she almost laughed aloud.

Ororo, Jean and Xavier were watching the new students interact.

"Um, I don't think I have heat vision." She glared at the window, trying to will any powers into functioning. So she was quite surprised when the light changed and she could suddenly see the patterns of heat overlaying things. "Whoa. I do have heat vision. That's a really funky way of seeing things."

"But you didn't melt anything," Kitty said in confusion.

"Oh, I thought you meant _see_ heat. Like thermal imaging. Oh, hey! Ultraviolet light." She focused on her hearing. "Ultrasonic hearing, too."

"Professor?" Ororo asked curiously. "Sheila is definitely an above-average mutant with all of these powers."

"Perhaps. They might still just be a matter of magnifying her body's potential. A very interesting expansion of one ability, much like Logan's enhanced senses," the bald man said as he leaned forward a bit in his wheelchair.

"I hadn't thought of that," Jean admitted carefully. "So like my telepathic and telekinetic abilities."

"Hey, you might be precognitive and able to pick up psychic impressions from objects; psychometry. And your telepathy really includes empathy, too," Sheila noted as she went over options. "You may also be able to start fires or make things cold through molecular motion. Pyrokinesis and cryokinesis."

"Hmm. I had not even thought of that. We might be limiting your abilities by not even attempting these other skills," the professor noted aloud.

"Oh, great. Now I'm going to be doing extra tests," Jean said in muted horror.

Later, in fact, Jean would discover she did have very minor talents in pyrokinesis and psychometry.

* * *

"Hey, Todd!" Sheila called out. Everyone around the front entrance of Bayville High School gave her an odd look, as the hunch-backed mutant was most definitely an outcast for the most part.

He looked a bit surprised but slunk over. "What?" he complained.

"Your back bothering you?" she asked curiously even as she held out a shopping bag.

"It's not too bad," he admitted. "Just can't stand straight. What's this?"

"Special supplies for helping you with your physiology. I talked to a nurse and then Professor Xavier to look at some medically suggested help." She gave him a winning smile. "Just a little help and you'll be beating off the girls with a stick," Sheila said while sticking her tongue out at him with a laugh. "I wrote down some instructions for why you would use them, just in case I made a mistake."

"Why are you helping me?" he asked suspiciously, his yellow eyes glaring at her in a beady, dark manner.

"It's not a huge deal. I just asked some questions and then had the professor order some things. No one likes being shunned," she noted as she shrugged. "It may not even work."

"Um, sure. Why not," the stooped-over mutant muttered. "Uh, thanks." With that he hopped off with his bag of skin care products.

Sheila followed him into the building sedately, feeling a bit of satisfaction at her success. She stopped off at her locker to drop off some of her books. Not because they were heavy, but because the other girls had given her an odd look at carrying them all around.

"Oh, it's beanpole. She probably hasn't even been asked out," Wendy called out snidely from about four lockers away.

"I'm elev- eleven?" Blue-green eyes blinked at that. "I _am_ eleven years old, you know. So I've still got some growing to do."

Wendy frowned, her pale face blotching up in anger that highlighted her freckles. She fluffed her dark-brown hair over her shoulder. "You are way too tall to be eleven. Though its a good excuse. You wouldn't be in high school if you were so young."

Sheila had her eyes closed as she held her head down, thinking furiously. "A-actually... I think I remember graduating high school. I've been taking college classes for over six months."

"What are you, some kind of genius?" Jennifer Secruz said snidely, backing up her friend.

"Yes. Even before... yes. I had an I.Q. over two hundred." Sheila was finally remembering, things starting to fall into place. Being raised by her adopted parents, tutors and graduating high school at ten years old. She kept her eyes closed as she kept remembering. "I need to talk to my guardian. I'm remembering everything."

"Gifted, huh? Must mean touched in the head," Wendy said with a cruel laugh. With that, the clique of girls headed off.

A she walked along in daze, she spotted a pair of red sunglasses. "Scott! Scott!" she called out, moving over with her _supernatural_ grace, weaving between the students with an absolute surety of ability. "I just had a breakthrough. I'm remembering a lot more."

"That's great," he said with a true smile. He was still feeling a bit of guilt over her injury.

"I-" Sheila stopped for a second. "I need to talk to Professor Xavier. It's really important."

"It can't wait until after school?" he asked in surprise. The first bell suddenly range.

"No, I don't think it can. I may not even be able to stay at the Institute. I'll see you later." She turned and headed to the main office.

Walking into the school office, she stood in line with a family and the two students in front of her. After five minutes she was at the front of the line.

"Can I help you?" the secretary asked, giving a winning smile on her handsome features. He looked like he should be in a commercial for teeth products.

"Yes, I need to check out to see my guardian. You know I was injured and have some problems with my memory?" She continued after he nodded. "Well, I'm remembering a lot more and its important that I talk to him."

"Do you need to call him for a pickup?" he asked carefully.

"I probably should, but I may just walk back to the Institute," Sheila explained. She walked over a phone at the end of the counter and called the professor. She was not looking forward to this conversation.

* * *

_'Come to my office,'_ Proffesor Xavier called out telepathically.

She nodded to acknowledge his request and opened the front door. She dropped her backpack on a couch and then walked to the professors office. It looked like he and Ororo were going over some paperwork. "Hello, professor. Miss Monroe. I, ah, had a breakthrough in my memory. I'm actually remembering everything now. Just like I normally would with my eidetic memory."

"Eidetic? Ah, the injury had scrambled your memories a bit. Now you are better? That's wonderful news. We should contact your parents immediately," he said with a smile.

"That's a great idea, just a little hard in implementation. I was sent here by my natural mother to this alternate reality for some reason. I don't even know how to get back." In fact, her mother had told her she would come for her. Or send Hermes to summon her home.

"That's rather unbelievable," Ororo said in a confused tone. "You aren't from our reality? That's something out of science fiction."

"So are mutants," Sheila replied a bit tartly. She laughed nervously. "Sorry, where I come from, mutants are just people with a few strange physical deformities. Like six fingers on their hands. Not super-powers."

"Yet you have powers. Even ignoring your invulnerability, you are physically above even top athletes," Xavier said.

"Um, that's hard to explain," she said sitting down in a seat across from the desk. "I get my super-powers, as we've called them, from my mother. But she's not exactly human."

"She's not human?" Xavier asked in a quite surprised tone.

"Well, she was all cryptic and such, but on my Earth... it isn't science and mutations, but gods and monsters." At their dubious expression, she looked uncertain. "I've actually fought against a Japanese demon; an Oni. He nearly flattened me with his club. And had to run away from a werewolf. The zombies really sucked."

"Do you have any proof of this?" Xavier asked, wondering if they had shattered the poor girls mind. Though the mystic was not totally unknown, he had always ascribed himself to it being just an unknown branch of physics they had not figured out yet.

"I think so. I have certain items that have powers. Like my amulet allows me to use healing powers." She reached into into somewhere else and pulled out a large pistol, silver and enscribed with words of power in ancient Greek. With a bit of effort, she then made it disappear. "I will have to think over why I'm invulnerable. That's actually a new thing."

"Who is your mother?" Ororo finally asked.

"Athena, goddess of wisdom and just war," she replied immediately. "And no, I don't know how that works with her being a virgin goddess. She didn't bother to explain that and I didn't think to ask the two times I've met her." She saw their skeptic looks and swallowed. "If you want, Professor Xavier, you can read my mind."

"I think that would be best. Try to relax and not think of anything in particular," the powerful telepath said in a calming voice.

Sheila closed her eyes and then brought herself to a meditative level when she felt the professor slip into her mind. Between one moment and another, she went from sitting in a chair to standing in a dark forest as the wind howled and rain splattered around. Next to her stood Professor X, who took in the scene.

"Ah, my fight with the zombies. They came from that way," the girl said, pointing deeper into the woods. She quickly pulled her pistol out.

"You are aware of my presence. That's quite interesting," Xavier said in bemusement.

"This might require a bit of adjustment, Professor, but most of my 'powers' are actually mental in nature. I'm athletic, but compared to some of my companions... I'm kind of a wimp."

The first zombies shambled out of the dusk, even as Sheila started shooting rapidly while keeping her distance. The pistol seemed to be inflicting damage far above what its caliber would suggest.

Then suddenly the scene change and the young girl was forced to dive out of the landrover as the nine foot tall monster swung his iron club at her, smashing the car into wreckage under the blazing sun of the Sahara desert. Then a tall, unknown teen, over six feet, grabbed the land rover and shattered it over the monster that looked exactly like a mythical Japanese Oni.

Sheila was snapping shots off as quickly as she could with her pistol, sending sprays of purple blood as the demon screamed invectives in ancient Japanese.

Then the scene blinked and she was suddenly inside a creepy house, full of cobwebs and soft moonlight. "Uh oh."

A girl stepped out of the shadows. "You are all alone." Her blood-red hair stuck out against her stark black leather outfit. "No silver and the Moon is rising."

"I never did find out why you worked for the Titans. Murdering people and reveling in the power of your 'monster' form," Sheila said to the mental apparition.

Her face started to shift and stretch as her eyes burned golden-brown. The werewolf started to snarl as her teeth grew longer and fur sprouted all over her body. With a suddenness that was shocking, the monster charged at her.

With a flick of change, they were all back in the real world as Sheila threw herself out of the chair and through a plaster wall with a smash and a cloud of dust. "YAAAAAAH!"

Ororo jumped up from her own seat at the sudden action and was following through the hole in the wall with remarkable speed. "Are you all right?

"Oh, sorry about that. The trip through my memories was a little startling. As a plus, my invulnerability is still working fine," she replied with wide eyes what were looking around carefully for the werewolf.

"Those were some amazing memories," Xavier said as he exited his office... through the door and in his wheelchair. "You do seem quite convinced of your story and it does explain some of your abilities."

Sheila brushed the dust and plaster out of her hair as she hopped to her feet. "So, um, I'm all good if you don't want me here. Since I'm not actually a mutant and all."

The white-haired mutant gasped at that. "What?"

"While you are not a mutant, you are a bit stranded and lost. Let's get you cleaned up and back to school," the professor said with a smile.

"Do I have to? I've already graduated high school and I was working on my university degree," she complained.

"Ah, that's right." Professor Xavier blinked. "University? What were you majoring in?"

"Internal Medicine, Mechanical Engineering, History with a couple of subs in Poly-Science and History," she explained happily.

"But aren't you a bit young for college? There is the socialization aspect that has to be taken into consideration," Xavier said as he led them to Ororo's office.

"Ah, about that? I'm actually younger than you think." She laughed a bit nervously. "I'm, um, only eleven, almost twelve. Please don't send me to middle school."

"You were in college at eleven?" Ororo asked carefully with a bit of surprise.

"Heck, that was before I was visited and got super-intelligence." Sheila gave them a shrug. "Though I will admit that I noticed my increased strength first when I broke the door to my bedroom."

"Hmm. What would you rate your intelligence at on the I.Q. scale?" Xavier asked as he leaned forward to put his elbows on the desk.

"It really doesn't work right. I'd have to have a tougher test made."

"Well, maybe I can look into it. I'd still suggest that you stay at Bayville High right now."

Sheila just groaned at his pronouncement.

* * *

**Chapter 3: The Rogue**

The ninja was sneaking out of a ventilation shaft when he ended up being confronted by Storm in her full combat outfit. "Impressive, you got past the automated defenses by using the air vents," she said stepped out of the shadows in the attic.

The ninja leaped back up in the air vents and Storm had to up her power and control, swirling a typhoon through a vent to flush the muscular ninja down into the Danger Room. Storm followed him down, but took over the control room. A blast of freezing rain did not do much more than inconvience him.

The ninja revealed himself to be Wolverine, using his claws to destroy two of the Danger Room's test weapons with pinpoint precisions.

"I think that's enough. After all, we don't need to break the entire Danger Room," Charles Xavier called out from the back of the control room.

"You were the one that wanted the demo," Wolverine remined.

"Demo? As in demolition or as in demonstration?" Scott Summers asked.

"Are you done messing with the weather?" Sheila asked Storm. "I can feel you still moving the winds around."

"Yes, I'm restoring the weather to its proper place. If I do not, I can cause inadvertent flooding or storms," she admitted while evincing a little curiosity. "I'm surprised you can tell."

"It's a bit of something that I get from my grandfather. My mother is the only one he allows to use his lightning bolts," Sheila explained with a shrug of her shoulders.

"What do you mean, Sheila?" Jean asked in confusion. Kurt was behind her, hanging from a pipe in the ceiling while the newest girl Kitty Pride looked on with a bit of pout.

"Well, my grandfather is known for throwing lightning bolts. He did pass that down to my mother, in a complicated way. I'm not that good at it, but I can get a sense for weather at times. Miss Monroe can really scramble that sense though," Sheila explained.

"Let's add some poison gas here, maybe some electrical contacts to zap intruders," Logan was saying as he messed with the computers as it showed him bypassing the defenses.

"Logan," Ororo said in a warning tone as her attention was brought back to him.

"Oh, all right. We'll use _knock-out_ gas," he continued in a huff.

"Yeah, because that will only have a chance of sending them into a coma," Sheila groused at him.

Kitty suddenly stood up, startling them all. "Doesn't all this freak you guys out?" Looking between them, she realized it really did not. "I guess not."

"It is odd, isn't it? And I didn't even wonder why this place has a security system that out-shines banks..." The taller girl frowned at that and then looked at the two adults. "Why do we need such an extreme security system?"

Logan and Ororo shared a concerned look, as they had not discussed the X-Men's enemies before.

That was when Professor Xavier rolled into the control room. "X-Men, assemble immediately for an urgent mission!" He looked quite serious.

"What's going on, professor?" Scott asked, suddenly all business.

"Cerebro has picked up a new mutant in Mississippi. It appears her mutant power may be out of control. A rogue mutant!"

* * *

"And then I vill level off at ten thousand feet," Kurt is saying as he pilots the SR-77 Blackbird.

"Very good, Kurt!" Cyclops tells him from the co-pilot's seat. "We'll make a pilot of you yet."

Aegis was sitting in the back with Shadowcat. "The engines on this plane must be super-efficient," Sheila muttered as she took in the spacious cabin area.

"What do you mean, Sheila?" the older, if shorter, girl asked.

"The SR-71 was a reconnaissance plane that was mostly fuel tank. I think this plane is really, really advanced. I didn't think you could do that and go so fast still." Faster, stealthier and a far larger payload. It was like something out of a science-fiction novel.

"You know, I hadn't thought of that. That's really cool, actually." The brunette scrunched up her face at Nighcrawler's antics up front. "Please tell me you are taking piloting lessons too?"

"I'm not even old enough for a learner's permit. Professor X isn't letting me learn, even if I am more mature than Kurt," the younger girl complained.

"How old are you?" Shadowcat asked in confusion.

"Um, almost twelve." Sheila winced at the stunned expression.

That was when Nightcrawler reappeared back inside the jet after an impromptu flying lesson. Only Aegis's quick reaction saved him from running into her. "Kurt! Just because I'm invulnerable doesn't mean you should smash into me!"

"Ah, sorry! I really didn't mean to," he apologized.

"Just stay away from us!" Kitty shouted as she stood up and then walked to the front of the plane.

"Be a bit more carefully, Kurt. You could have killed yourself teleporting outside like that," Sheila said as she settled back down.

* * *

They were on the streets of Jackson, on the trail of the rogue mutant. They were just coming down the street of a rural neighborhood with the guidance of Professor X when they saw two women talking. The younger was wearing all green and pulled away from the older woman who was wearing sunglasses and carrying cane for the blind. The old woman tried to hold on, but only kept a glove.

"There she is," Wolverine rumbled out.

"They are here!" the girl shouted in fear at the sight of the orange and black wearing mutant. "Run, Irene! Run!" And with that, she took off with her own advice.

"Wow, she's freaking out a lot. She seems terrified of you, Wolverine," Nightcrawler called out at he, Shadowcat, Wolverine and Aegis followed. "Why don't let me approach her instead."

"I suggest you put your best face forward, Elf," Logan said while suppressing a snarl.

"Good idea," Sheila interjected carefully. "But why don't you let me do the first contact. One, I'm a girl and two, I don't have to worry about an image inducer. Let's not tempt Murphy."

"She's right," Shadowcat said with a nod. "I'll follow along." And prove that she was just as useful as either of the younger mutants!

"Good point. Go for it, fräulein," the blue-furred mutant said with a thumb's up.

"Ja, Herr Wagner!" she called out, zipping forward far faster than the other mutants, leaping over a low house.

"She still has a horrible American accent," Nightcrawler complained.

Aegis landed about ten feet away from the girl in green who was huffing and puffing away as she leaned foward with her hands on her knees, her striped-hair hanging in her face. "Hello, I mean you no harm." She held up her hands and smiled. "I'm Sheila. But I'm supposed to go by Aegis when I'm in costume."

"Hu huf," Rogue gasped out. "You aren't going to attack me?"

"Why would I do that? I'm here to help you. But that will work better if you calm down a little bit," the blonde said as she sat down.

"You are wearing a weird outfit like that guy that attacked me earlier. And you were with him," the distressed girl almost shouted.

"Him? The blue one or the older guy in orange and black? And when did he attack you?" Sheila asked in confusion. "I know he's grumpy all the time, but he's not really mean."

"He attacked me just twenty minute ago-!" the striped-haired girl started to exclaim as she stood up angrily when Shadowcat charged in by phasing through a fence.

"I've got her!" the smaller girl called out, tackling Rogue to the ground.

Rogue suddenly had a flash of memory, knowing instantly how to counter this with a wrestling move of Cody's. With a twist and a roll, she flipped Shadowcat across the ground none too gently.

"Shadowcat!" Sheila hissed. "We were talking it out!" Oh well, time to clamp her down physically. "Please calm down. I really don't-" Aegis had been planning on using her superior strength, but the rogue mutant's bare left hand slapped into her invulnerable face because Sheila had been totally unworried about the move. "W-Wha-!"

They struggled, Aegis getting weaker by the second while Rogue became stronger. With an adrenaline surge, Rogue suddenly flung the unconscious blonde through a fence and into a parked car.

"What's going on?" Rogue cried out. "Have to get away. Run away... fast!" And suddenly the green-garbed took off in a sprint, as fast as Sheila ever had and leaped over a short, one story house. She was ducking through traffic and suddenly realized she was passing the cars fairly easily on the main road. An unbidden smile crept up on her face. "Wahooo!" she shouted, running even faster much to the consternation of the drivers of the cars she was passing.

Shadowcat rolled over. "That wasn't smart, Kitty," she grumbled. Looking around, she did not see anyone. She stood up, spotting the damaged fence. "Sheila?"

That was when Nightcrawler appeared in a puff of sulfurous smoke. "Vhat happened?" he asked.

"I did, unfortunately. I think Sheila was calming her and then I jumped in and tackled her. To like show I could be useful," she babbled as she scrambled over to the broken fence. "Uh, oh. Mr. Wolverine! I think Sheila is hurt!"

"How the hell did Miss Invulnerable get hurt?" he growled as he ran up. Seeing the crumpled form laying half in the windshield, he frowned. "No blood. In fact..." He suddenly extended a single blade and swung a light cut. "Not even a scratch. She's still invulnerable, but unconscious."

"Maybe it is some sort of mental attack? Ja, that would make sense," Nightcrawler said, slapping his fist in the palm of his other hand.

"Chuck, we got a problem," Wolverine thought loudly.

* * *

Rogue stopped about fifteen minutes later in a park. She looked around, a bit confused. "Where am ah?" she asked in confusion. It only took her a moment to retrace her run mentally. "I crossed the Pearl River? Well, ah bet they can't track me down that fast."

She frowned as she sat on the grass under the moonlit night, going over her memories. "Something ain't ahdding up. Wolverine was with the me that is Sheila and had been for the last three hours. So how come ah remember him attacking me. And mah Sheila memories say that Wolverine wouldn't act like that."

She suddenly slapped her fist into her palm. "Ah got it. Someone is framing him. Ah guess that answers the of why the Institute has such extreme security. The X-Men have some enemies. But how do ah figure into this? At least ah got this super-intelligence to help figure it out." She reached for her pocket communicator before realizing that was something _Sheila_ had, not herself. "Ah got to figure out a way to protect mahself. Wait, Professor X is a telepath. Ah can think out to him." _'Professor? Can you hear me?'_

The telepath was quite startled by the clear mental voice that was a near match for Sheila. _'Aegis? Are you all right?'_ he mentally asked.

_'This ain't Sheila, just us using her super-brain,'_ Rogue thought back. _'Ah figured out someone is trying to frame you guys. Unless Wolverine suddenly has the power to be in multiple places?'_

At least she was talking. _'No, he does not. That must mean Mystique is about. She's a shapeshifter. Are you aware that you are sending people into comas?'_

_'Ah am? Is Cody going to be all right?'_ she asked in concern as she suddenly worried about the boy.

_'It appears he is recovering now that you have mentally knocked out Aegis,'_ he sent back. _'Your powers are out of control and I would like to help you.'_

_'Ah don't know. Irene said ah shouldn't trust you X-Men, but mah memories from Sheila have showed how you helped Kurt and her.'_

_'Of course. That is one of the major reasons I formed my institute, to help mutants better themselves with their powers.'_ The professor smiled as the van drove to pick up his X-Men.

That was when Storm stepped out of the shadows under some trees. "There you are. You are really causing a problem," the African-America snapped out angrily. "You are coming with us. Or else!"

Rogue looked confused. "This ain't lahk you, Storm." Then it suddenly dawned on her. _'Professor? You still there? Where is Storm?'_

_'She's with me. Which means if you see her, then you are looking at Mystique_.' He looked over at the real Storm, getting a quick true sense for her mind to make sure that she had not switched places here.

"Ah think ah don't like my mind being messed with," the girl wearing green angrily as she charged forward in an almost blur.

The fake storm had just a moment to realize her disguise had been seen through when the punch connected to her jaw with more than human force, sending her to skid into the mud. "How?" she said in confusion.

"Why are you pretending to attack me as X-Men?" the girl demanded. "Ah know you ain't the real Storm... your voice ain't quahte rahght."

"You are confused and the X-Men are going to take you down," Mystique tried to bluff.

"What did you have for supper, Storm? Ah bet you can't tell me, because you ain't her," Rogue demanded as she kicked out, slamming a kick onto the ground where the fake Storm's head had been. Rogue then narrowed her eyes as she charged forward, grabbing the shape-shifter by the neck... and with skin touching. She felt Mystique's memories flooding her even as she felt her power bleeding off the previous, stolen memories and enhanced intelligence. She suddenly felt very stupid in comparison.

Mystique collapsed back in to her real form with a groan as Rogue gained her powers and memories.

"Ah was being used. All ah I'm to her is a pawn. Irene, ah trusted you," the girl realized as she got the memories of the two's earlier conversation. She had no idea who to trust for sure.

* * *

"This was where I sensed your mind, Aegis," Xavier said as the van drove to the edge of the park across the Pearl River. "But that faded as you woke up."

"I don't see her, professor," Cyclops called out, looking around the dark park next to a stream.

"Wolverine?" Storm asked her team mate.

"On it," he grumbled as he hopped out of the van. Sheila was right behind him, scanning around with her enhanced vision. She settled on something similar to 'low-light' vision and looked around. "Over there." She took off at a run the half mile where Rogue was at the edge of the trees and a stream. "Hello," she called out to the green-wearing girl. "You know, I just noticed you really like green."

Rogue snorted in laughter. "Hi, Sheila. Mystique is going to be out for a bit. She was trying to trick me. Ah don't like that, so ah'm willing to go with you to hear what Professor Xaiver offers. But that's only 'cause ah know he won't force me to stay."

"Sounds good," the blonde replied. "So what does your powers do other than knock people out by touch?"

That was when Nightcrawler popped in behind Rogue.

"Uh, ah can absorb people's powers and minds. Ah loved being able to run like you do. Are you really able to see all that all the tahme?" Rogue asked. "And are you really the daughter of Athena?"

"Ah... yeah. That's pretty much me." Sheila was blinking as she realized what Rogue was saying and who was hearing it. "How does that even work beyond 'it's magic'?"

The van drove up with Scott in the driver's seat as Wolverine ran up. "Is everyone all right?"

"I think we are all fine, now," Sheila said as she looked over to Rogue who nodded.

"Ah don't wanna be here any more. Can we leave before Mystique wakes up?" the Southern Belle asked impatiently.

"Will she recover?" Xavier asked from the back of the van.

"That kid Cody did and so did I. I don't even really feel weak, so I think her drain is just temporary," Sheila posited aloud.

Everyone piled in for the drive to the airport.

"Um, Sheila, I'm really sorry. I just wanted to prove that I'm not useless," Kitty blurted out in the cramped van.

"I know. Just try not to let it happen again. I'm sure we'll get lots of practice in the Danger Room," the youngest girl said with a grin.

"How come ah'm a little worried about this Danger Room?" Rogue asked with a little worry. She actually knew a little bit, as not all of Sheila's memories had faded.

Jean answered with adroitness, "Because you must have good instincts."

That got a bunch of laughter out of everyone.

* * *

"Thanks for letting me stay in yer room," Rogue said the next day.

"Well, supposedly the Institute is going to get busy soon, so we are going to have to double up on rooms," Sheila admitted as she flopped onto her separate twin bed.

"Ah'm just surprised you weren't freaked out about me drainin' ya," the stripe-haired girl said. She frowned at her limited clothing options.

"It didn't really hurt and it was a good lesson in humility. Just because I can't be hurt physically, doesn't mean I can't be affected. I bet Jean or Professor X could put a mind whammy on me," she continued, staring at the ceiling.

The new girl looked at Sheila for a long moment. "Ah can still remember a lot from you. Ah think it has to do with your mind and all. When are you goin' to tell them you may never go home?" Rogue asked her suddenly.

"I don't know that. I just... suspect that I was sent here beyond the reach of the Titans." Sheila pulled her knees up to her chest. "Athena could just be being careful, but..." She rolled onto her side. "...she could be planning that their battle against the Titans will destroy my world."

Rogue gulped at that. "Well, like you said, it mahght just be a precaution."

And if Sheila kept saying it, she might even believe it.

* * *

**Chapter 4: Big Time Rumble**

"Ah don't get why we are messing with my powers," Rogue complained in the Danger Room a few days later. Like Shadowcat and Aegis, she was wearing a fairly standard 'uniform' that had the center stripe as green, compared to Aegis's white and Shadowcat's pale blue. She was much more adult in her build, though even the young mutant that could phase was more developed than the non-mutant.

"It's actually better for you if we have some idea of _how_ your power works. Why is it touch and not who you look at? How do you learn to control it?" Aegis was saying. "So let's do some very basic tests. Rogue, I would like you to lightly touch Shadowcat with one finger for only a brief moment." The blonde was already adjusting her eyes to function like super-sensitive Kirlian cameras.

"Why does it have to be me?" the brown-haired (and shortest) girl complained.

"I'm looking with my 'super-senses' of course. Kurt has fur which might hamper the test, Scott has an uncontrolled power and Jean is with Logan meeting a new mutant," Sheila listed off. "And the rest of the adults are watching us from the control room. I'm not sure Rogue would _want_ to absorb Wolverine and I guess Storm's powers might be very volatile."

"Are you really eleven? You talk lahke you are an adult," the newest X-Men complained.

Aegis rolled her eyes at the pair. "Today, team?"

Rogue barely touched Shadowcat. "Ah can feel ah got something, even with that."

"Yes, your aura latched on and pulled it out. Try to release the part you pulled into your own aura now," the younger and much more blonde girl said.

After ten minutes, all that they had succeeded in doing was just annoying Rogue and Shadowcat.

"Okay, we need a change of plan. Rogue, you said that you gained my senses? That might allow you to 'feel' how this works. Just don't leave me knocked out too long, okay?" And with that, Sheila took Rogue's hand with her own bare hand and held on as long as she could while _trying_ and failing to resist. She thumped to the floor unconscious.

"Ah see what she wants me to try," Rogue said in realization. "Sheila really is weirdly smart." She reached out and touched Shadowcat's face with a fingertip. "She's right. I can 'feel' it pulling your aura. And being able to see it really helps. Ah will try again." And she did, while watching the Kirlian aura and the feel. For just a second, she could feel Shadowcat's skin before the sensation of her power draining her aura kicked in. "I... I stopped it for just a second!" She had pulled her finger back immediately upon the sensation of draining.

"Really? You aren't just joking?" Kitty asked with a happy smile.

"But only for a second," she complained. Rogue frowned in deep thought as she went and tried to think of a solution. "Ah guess ah can do meditation. Sheila knows several types, though she's never practiced any. Tibetan could work."

"That's great to hear, Rogue. I think we shall call this a success," Professor Xavier said from the Danger Room control console up above. "Why don't you carry Sheila back to your room?"

"Ah think ah might be able to..." Rogue said, trying to push back the power with the feeling letting her release the aura. "That worked, too!"

"Whoa, woozy," Aegis said from the ground.

"So you just need lots of practice and meditation?" Kitty asked with a not too pleased look.

"Chi kung meditation will be best." The youngest X-Men sat up, looking confused. "That's strange, I'm pretty sure I didn't think that up."

"No, that was me, using your knowledge. How can you remember that?" Rogue asked.

Up in the control room, Xavier and Storm shared a surprised look.

"That's... a really good question." Sheila was frowning at that.

* * *

Sheila looked over at the huge kid with the blond mohawk as he walked by their seat in the high school cafeteria with an incredibly large pile of food on his tray. "I guess he's a big eater."

"He's the mutant we tried to meet yesterday. I guess that was why he was meeting with Principal Darkholme," Jean said as she put her her milk box down on her tray of food. "He's the one that broke the lockers by the office."

"I'm sorry, what?" the youngest girl said in confusion.

Rogue and Kitty shared a wince at that.

"He appears to have a strong measure of super-strength," the red-head admitted.

"No, the part about Darkholme meeting a mutant student way outside of Bayville. Because that sounds very suspicious," Sheila asked as she corrected Jean's mistake about what she was asking about.

"So she was meeting with a new student?" Kurt asked in confusion.

Rogue suddenly realized what Sheila was saying. She _knew_ who Principal Darkholme actually was, after all. She was Mystique, as her fading memories from draining the shapeshifter revealed.

"You don't think that is weird-!" Sheila was starting to say when there was a crash and the huge kid from earlier had sent some of his food flying to hit Duncan's table. "The hell?"

Duncan looked ready to murder the huge new kid. Fred Dukes was having a really bad time of it after breaking his chair (by sitting on it) and smashing his table. Unfortunately, he was quite klutzy due to his weight and kept falling down. This was proving very humorous to the surrounding kids who started laughing at him.

"Guess I better help him back up," Sheila said as she stood up, shaking her head.

Fred suddenly started throwing food into the crowd. His face was quite flushed and he looked extremely angry. "Quit- laughing- at- me!" he yelled out, punctuating each word with move food being thrown.

"Food fight!" one of the younger freshmen yelled out.

Kurt ducked the food fight by teleporting outside, Jean started to block things with her telekinisis. Kitty, unfortunately was not nearly so lucky, getting a facefull of casserole.

"Ewww," the valley-girl from Chicago screeched out, phasing through the ground.

Rogue had lowered herself behind table as Scott ducked and rolled. "Where's boy scout going?"

"Just getting more room to duck," Sheila said with a sigh as let a burger fly past her ear. She twisted to the side as someone threw their milk box at her from behind.

"Fred?" Jean called out, trying to reach the childish brute. "This isn't helping anything."

Sheila and Rogue were both keeping an eye out on the red-head as she tried to reach the huge teen. Currently, he was swinging a table wildly around.

"They shouldn't laugh at me!" he yelled out like a child, smashing the table to kindling.

Sheila noted that Rogue was leaving _and _that Scott was keeping an eye out for Jean. "I'm going to head out, okay Scott?" With that, she threaded her way out of the very messy cafeteria. "Hey, Rogue! Are you still up for practice on McBeth later?"

Rogue rolled her eyes as she closed her locker. "Ah'm sure. Did you want to practice at the Institute or somewhere else?"

"Somehow, I don't think you are a big nature lover, so we can do it back home," the blonde said, then looked over Rogue's shoulder as a woman stepped out. "Mrs. Darkholme?"

"What are you two doing?" the principal asked in a scathing voice.

"Look, Mystique, we are just talking about meeting up after school to study. Ah don't take kindly to threats," Rogue shot right back. "So back off of I let everyone know about you."

"Ah, suddenly it makes better sense. So subversion, hm. Somehow I don't think you want to be here. You sure don't act like it, so that means you _have_ to be here. Which means you're a flunky," Sheila suddenly deduced.

"Get to class before I give you detention for life," Darkholme demanded. "You don't know anything, girl. So keep your thoughts to yourself."

"Come on, Rogue."

* * *

"Rogue! Sheila! Jean has been kidnapped by that kid from school," Kurt cried out as he appeared next to them on the back porch of the Institute.

"Ah was afraid that was going to happen," the striped-haired girl said in complaint.

"They are already on their way. I think Scott is very angry against this Blob," the blue-furred mutant said. "I'm supposed to teleport you to the abandoned warehouse."

In five minutes we were in our X-Men uniforms, green-accented for Rogue, white for Aegis.

They split up, using Scott's sportscar, the X-Van and one of the spare sedans to search the area. Rogue was driving her and Aegis in an industrial section of town when they got the call that Wolverine had found Jean. They drove over there, only to find a battle going on.

"Cyclops?" Aegis called out, running over to the unconscious teen. His face was exposed and he looked quite normal. Wolverine was laid out under his motorcycle.

"Here's his vahsor," Rogue called out.

"Sounds like this blob is a tough customers." Sheila looked over at Cyclops and surprised herself when she could feel her legend awaken at her command and heal him of most of his bruises. She quickly did the same with Wolverine to verify that she could. "I- I guess I've gotten more powerful."

"What happened?" Wolverine asked as he woke up feeling better than he thought he should.

"We found you knocked out here. Ah thought you weren't supposed to lead with your chin?" Rogue said with an easy grin.

"Well, that didn't work so well. And I'm still seeing double. Rogue," Cyclops called out, "Absorb my power." He closed his eyes and took off his visor.

"Ah got you," Rogue said, impressed with his thinking and bravery.

Aegis and Wolverine moved into the warehouse and were finding that the Blob was just nearly indestructible.

"Great," Wolverine complained as his claws failed to cut the huge man.

"You shoulda stayed away," Fred shouted as he swatted at Wolverine. He finally got lucky and sent the feral-looking mutant flying through a wall.

Rogue tried to send a blast out with Cyclops powers, but fumbled the use of the visor and only blasted a hole in the wall. "How does Cyclops see in this thang?" she complained.

"Rogue! Move!" Aegis shouted as she saw the Blob jump into the air. Moving faster than she thought she could, she managed to push the green-loving girl out of the way.

WHOOOMP!

"Ha! That'll show you!" Fred shouted gleefully. He felt someone under him trying to lift him up. "You can't move me if I don't wanna be moved."

"Sheila!" Rogue called out. Her glowing eyes were visible, as her spill had knocked Cyclop's visors off.

The young blonde was under the Blob. She kept trying lift him up, but all she was doing was breaking up the concrete under her. "This- is- embarrassing!" she complained as she failed to lift him up, even with her strength.

"Get off mah friend," Rogue shouted, launching a heavy concussive bolt of red at Fred, knocking him off her room-mate.

"Thanks, Rogue! He wasn't exactly hurting me, but I have having trouble breathing," Aegis said as she hopped to her feet. "Hey? You don't _need_ Cyclop's visor? That means you can control his power better than he can. That doesn't make sense-"

"Quite ignoring me!" Fred shouted as he charged Aegis, only to see her hop over his head. "Hey!" He was staggered as Rogue blasted him with Cyclop's power again.

"Why can't ah knock him over?" Rogue asked in worry as the huge teen started moving towards her.

"Because I'm the strongest and toughest!" Fred shouted out as he struggled towards Rogue.

"Hey, bub. You need to learn how to treat a lady right," the feral mutant said. Wolverine landed on his back, distracting him for a second before being thrown through another wall.

"So we need to quite fighting you head on. Hey, Fred, do you know how you fight against a sumo?" Aegis asked as she zipped in front of him. "You attack his weak points." She grabbed his pinky, ducked and then twisted. With a pop, the finger dislocated.

"Agh! That hurts!" he screamed, closing his eyes. That actually saved his sight as Aegis jabbed two fingers in his eyes.

She kicked his ankle hard, spraining it. "What? It isn't fun kidnapping people with friends that fight back?" she said nastily.

"You're just like everyone else! You're always laughing at me!" he shouted out as he tried to grab Aegis. But she was way too quick, ducking under the simple grab.

Rogue reached their melee, her hands uncovered. "Ah can take your power for mah own," she informed, starting to drain his strength.

"I'm too powerful for that," he shouted right back, swinging a massive punch at Rogue. So he was quite surprised when it was blocked by Aegis.

"My turn," Aegis called out as she grabbed Fred's hand and twisted it painfully while tripping him onto his face. "Rogue! Go make sure Jean is free."

"Let go! Quit hurting me!" Fred shouted at the painful joint-lock, his arm levered behind his back.

"Fred, just stop it," Jean called out. "I'm leaving. You aren't my friend. Friends don't kidnap each other. Just stay away."

Of course given Sheila would be close by was very good reason in Fred's mind to stay away from Jean. He never realized someone could hurt him like that. "I'll stay away."

Outside, Rogue was putting Cyclop's visor on his face for when he woke up. "Ah'm glad we got this fixed up. That Blob was a right pain. Ah couldn't believe it when he walked through Cyclop's blasts."

"He sat on me," Aegis complained. "And he was too heavy to lift off."

"I'm sure you'll survive," Jean said as she held out her hand and picked up Cyclops with her telekinesis.

That was when Nightcrawler and Shadowcat arrived in the X-Van

* * *

Rogue was sitting on her bed in her green t-shirt and cut-off sweat pants (both green, naturally), trying to meditate before bed. With her face scrubbed clean, she looked a lot more innocent. Across the room, Sheila was sitting on her bed, rapidly reading as she sat on her bed in shorts and a cut-off T-shirt.

"Ah still feel odd doing this," Rogue grumbled.

"Er, well I should be doing some of it, too. Some of my powers are pretty ooohm-ooohm sensitive." Sheila rolled on her back to stare at the ceiling. "Did you know I can actually just see what's wrong with a body? Illness or wounds, I can just see it. Makes learning medical terms half-useless. I can't heal much more than bruises or cuts yet."

"Yet? So you think you can do more than heal eventually?" the other girl asked curiously.

"From what I remember, I should be able to control reproduction or the viability of a child. I think I'm very close to being able to cure diseases and poisons. Eventually I should be able to regenerate limbs or even slow down aging. And that's just the 'healing' sort of powers I have. I've inherited some powers of War and dominion over the sky, though I think Storm is way more powerful than I can hope to be in that regard."

Rogue tilted her head at the other girl as she thought it over. "So you can see why Professor Xavier can't walk?"

"And that you are developing a cavity on one of your teeth and... you have light sensitivity eczema caused by a drug," Sheila said, looking over at girl on her bed.

"What are you talking about?" Rogue asked in confusion.

"You skin is artificially sensitive to sunlight due to an overdose of a antihistamine that has a side-effect of making you fairly sensitive. If you are taking any pills or cremes, I would suggest stopping."

Rogue looked devastated. "Irene even went that far?"

"I'm sorry, Rogue-!" the young heroine was saying when a spark of light appeared in the middle of the room.

In a single moment, it turned into a bubble, making the walls and roof disappear. What was visible outside was... nightmare. They were high above the lands. A shattered, scarlet Moon hung in the sky as a massive man wearing a lion's skin hammered at a giantess that dwarfed mountains. His fists rang with the power to shatter mountains.

Pallas Athena, Goddess of Wisdom and War appeared before the two of them. "Sheila, my daughter, heed my words and bear witness to the last legacy. At this time, the Earth dies as we fight Gaia. She will not see reason and only bears hate in her children."

The ground grew up beneath the massive Hercules, vines entangling him even as his club rained blows down upon the personification of Earth itself.

"Hercules weakens her. Now it comes done to the final moves. With my death, youngest daughter, you become the final Dodekathon. Never falter and may you find greatness in your future." Athena turned her helmeted head and readied her spear. Lightning sparked across the tip as she suddenly grew greater than even a goddess; becoming the personification of War: The General. More terrible than even the guttering red stars in the sky, she threw a bolt at a perfect weakness.

Gaia saw the bolt coming at her, but the bolt of nova-white energy slammed into the greater titan before she could move the Earth to block the attack.

Rogue's eyes were wide open as Gaia exploded, her death-throes traveling into the Earth below her. Great cracks appeared in the ground as plumes of lava shot hundreds of feet into the air, barely reaching the Gaia's ankles. "Too- immense-!" she said, clutching her head, but unable to cover her eyes.

_"MOTHER!"_ Sheila screamed out, trying vainly to reach out into the mystical image.

Their deaths unleashed opposed, uncontrolled Avatars. The Green tried to overtake the Arbiter, even as their essences ripped mountains apart, blasted seas into massive waves. Massive islands of land started to float into the sky on jets of lava as the world ripped itself apart... as the concept of _Earth_ become damaged... lessened... and something new.

The Green gave way to the Shaper, even as the Beast clawed into the maker of land and earth. Wounded Gigantes, collapsed on the ground due to their injuries screamed as their mile tall bodies fell into lava filled cracks. Plumes of fire and lava roared into the skies, hundreds of miles tall.

Finally Gaia's green essence burned with the power of the Scourge, even as Athena's soul burned with the power of the Savior, heedless of the fact there was no one to heal or harm.

The vision faded as the General appeared again, uncontrollable and unstoppable, smiting the dispersing essence of Gaia into the black, soot-stained firmament.

All that was left was a comatose Rogue, her mind teetering on the edge as she tried to imagine the immensity of a reality destroyed by its gods and their ancestors and the weeping daughter of the last goddess of the Dodekathon.

Scott slammed open the door in a panic, trying to see what could cause such a heart-rending cry. "Sheila! Rogue! What's going on?" He walked up to Rogue, but her brown eyes were unseeing and grabbed her clad shoulder.

Sobbing drew his attention to the other girl.

That was when Jean ran into the room. "What's going on? What happened?"

"Gone. A whole world... gone," Rogue muttered in shock.

"What do you mean, Rogue?" Scott demanded.

Jean closed her eyes and tried to get a read from Rogue. The images almost overwhelmed her, causing her to stagger. The anguish coming from the other girl hurt her to even hear the edge of it. "Professor! I need your help!"

"Jean, join with my mind. We need to put them into a dreamless sleep," the professor said as he rolled up to the door; Ororo, Logan, Kitty and Kurt right behind him.

"What happened, professor?" the African-American woman asked.

As the two girls collapsed asleep, he bowed his head. "Something horrible, I fear."

* * *

Scott and Jean were walking together, talking quietly as they entered the school. They didn't even realize that they passed by Lance Alvers and a new girl.

"Those are two of Xavier's dweebs?" the girl with long, blonde hair asked.

"Right, Regan. I don't see that other girl, but she's usually with Kitty and that skunk-head girl."

"Well, it sounds like I've got my work cut out for me here as Lady Mastermind," the new girl said. "You'll have to introduce me to your friend sometime."

"Sure. Kitty's a smart girl. I'm sure that we can show her the truth of the lies behind Xavier. Humans and mutants coexisting?" Lance just shook his head as if to remove some cobwebs in his head.

From around the corner behind them, another of the mutants at the high school frowned. He wasn't sure he liked the new girl, Regan Wyngarde. She gave him the heebie-jeebies. He hopped along, finally spotting Rogue and a very distraught looking Sheila. "Hey, yo! What's the stitch?"

"Hey, Todd. I just found out my mother died last night," Sheila said slowly. She really just wanted to head back to bed, but Rogue had dragged her out of bed. Literally.

"Oh, um, sorry to hear that. I just, uh, wanted to say thanks. That stuff you gave me helped a lot. Not perfect, you know, but much better." He visibly brightened. "I even got complimented on not stinking!"

"T-That's great," Sheila managed to get out before she started crying.

"Ah, dammit. Ah just got her to stop," Rogue said in a plaintive tone. She was uncomfortably patting the blonde on her back with gloved hands as Todd looked on.

"Well, I'm sorry to hear that. Um, I hope you get feeling better," the hunchbacked mutant said uncomfortably as he started to move away. Being an unwanted orphan, he had no concept on how to feel in this situation.

"Thanks, Todd." Sheila was rubbing at the tears in her eyes. "Sorry, Rogue. I'm being really stupid right now."

"Ah I think would be said too, so that's not stupid. Come on."

* * *

"Jean!" Kitty called out as she dashed up to a red-headed girl in the halls at Bayville High. "Oh, I'm terribly sorry. I thought you were someone else."

"That doesn't happen often," the new girl said said with a grin.

"I'm Kitty Pryde. And actually, my friend has red hair, so that's why I mistook you. Are you new?" the younger girl asked as she held her books to her chest.

"Yeah, I just transferred in today. My names Julia. Julia Carpenter. Well, I have to get to class. See you around, Kitty!" the new girl called out as he trotted off.

The young mutant looked at the other girl as she moved off with grace, ducking between a group of jocks. "Huh. That's odd. Why does she remind me of Sheila when she does that?" She had to get to class herself.

* * *

After school, the X-Men were in a training exercise on the grounds. It was a game of team-tag, using their powers to the best affect. Kitty, Rogue, Jean, Scott and Kurt were all quite in it, while Sheila was gamely trying to play but was really distracted. She had so far managed to not run anyone over, but she had almost smacked into a tree or two.

The youngest person suddenly felt a something in the air, grabbing onto a tree branch before a wind that Storm whipped up suddenly set the rest of students rolling into the grass.

"Ah, are you sure you want to just hold on there?" Storm asked as she riled up the wind even further.

Sheila just responded by digging her fingers into the tree even harder.

"I think that's enough, Storm. She responded quite quickly to the unexpected attack," Xavier called mentally as he rolled out from the main building.

Sheila stuck out her tongue at the older woman and then launched herself into the air with a massive bound, landing over a hundred feet away and right next to Kitty. "Upsey-Daisey!" she said with a forced grin, helping the girl to her feet.

"Ow, that hurt," the brunette complained.

"It was supposed to," Logan almost growled as he trotted over while Storm landed on the grass next to him. "Better a little pain to make you more aware than you getting seriously hurt later."

"That's Wolverine's version of tough love," Scott said with a rueful grin as he stretched his aching back. "He's not really a sadist."

"Mah butt says otherwise," Rogue replied as she rubbed her rear while she stood up gingerly.

Kurt stared for just a second before he looked away. "I need to learn how to teleport better, I'm afraid."

Sheila hopped about three feet, while she tried to get the wind to swirl around her like it had Storm. "Hmm. Not quite that simple."

"The cape makes it easier," the white-haired woman said in explanation.

"But capes are normally bad. Especially for someone that doesn't throw lightning bolts," she complained. She held out her hands in concentration, forcing the wind into a concentrated updraft that swirled right around her tightly.

"Is she trying to fly?" Jean asked as she floated over. Unlike the rest of the X-Men, she had not been sent tumbling thanks to her telekinisis.

"And not succeeding," the girl in question responded. She was sure she was very close, but really could just not bother to push herself right then. She just slouched a bit and looked off into the distance.

"All right then, I want you to run until you get tired," Logan called out, pointing around the institute. "And no slacking off."

Sheila started running with the rest around the Institute, but it was fairly obvious after one track that she was not really straining. "Sorry guys. Guess I need to run alone." That seemed to match her dark mood as she knuckled down and started to really run. She passed them easily at the halfway point, then pulled on her legend, speeding up dramatically.

"The hell?" Logan called out as she buzzed past him at well over one-hundred miles an hour... and accelerating. "Chuck, you getting this on the cameras?" he asked the telepath with a a loud 'mental voice'.

"Yes, Sheila is starting to worry Rogue. I had no idea that she could go so fast." He was rolling towards the main control room of the Danger Room, which had the best computer consoles to review the security systems.

With tears streaming into her hair, she suddenly realized she was going to need to run a lot longer. And she wanted to feel the burn of a really good run. Abruptly, she kept going straight instead of circling the institute. A single bound had her over the stone boundary wall in less than three seconds. Her eyes were narrowed as she left tears in her wake.

* * *

The SR-77 Blackbird's engines whined as they shifted to VTOL to land in a field next to a convenience store in the valley. Sheila was shivering a little bit as she sat on the barbwire fence as it swayed. Mini-spotlights were illuminating the ground in the dark, making it look almost like a UFO from popular fiction.

"Come on, kid." Logan's voice was gruff, but not _really _that gruff from the open ramp as it lowered.

"Um, thanks for coming and picking me up. I could have just run back later," the young girl said as she walked in. "I guess I took your words a bit too literally to keep running until I got tired."

"Over twelve hours? You made it to Oregon," he replied with a snort. "Chuck might want to talk to you about the fuel bill, but I think he was happy to see you test your limits. You really improved there on your physical endurance."

"Yeah, I'm becoming less and less human all the time," she admitted with a strained tone. "Do I have to go to school in two hours?"

"Are you tired?" he asked.

"I'm worn, but not sleepy." She stared out into the night sky as the Blackbird screamed into the air, higher and higher.

"You want to talk, String-bean?" Logan asked from the pilots seat as he set the autopilot to fly back to New York, only an hour away.

"Do you have any family?" she asked morbidly as she pulled her knees up to her chest, wrapping her hands around them.

"No idea." He tapped his forehead. "Might have, but I can't remember. It's what Chuck is helping me with. Kind of wish I did, even if they were dead. At least I'd know."

She nodded as she thought about it. "It's not like I really want to forget them. I mean... I only met my real mother twice. I guess I'll never learn how I'm her daughter when she's a virgin goddess."

"I wondered at that, but I figured it wasn't my business," he replied with a chuckle as he checked the controls.

"She could have just molded me from clay, like Prometheus did humanity. She is a goddess of wisdom and craft, so I might be some sort of test-tube baby. Or I could be just adopted. And those are just the 'pleasant' options. She was nearly raped by Hephaestus, though that was a bit of a miscommunication. I wonder if she ever forgave him?"

"Sheesh, Bean, you sure are morbid." Logan reached over and scruffed her head.

"I'm not sure I shouldn't be. But I'm not going into obscurity." Sheila clenched her fist. "I owe it to them all to raise to the highest pinnacle of my ability and Legend. And maybe I can do some good for human and mutant relations at the same time."

* * *

"Stephen, it has been a long time," Professor Xavier said to the astrally projecting sorcerer as he rolled into his office and felt the presence.

_'Xavier? You are correct, it's been a few years,' _the Master of the Mystic Arts as he floated along. _'I sensed a massive disruption in the ley lines here in Bayville. To be truthful, I had forgotten that this is where your family estates were. Did one of your students tamper with forces they should not have?'_

"A disruption in the ley lines? As of a day ago?" the bald mutant asked.

_'I take it you know what happened then,'_ the astral-ghost said on that far yet so close plane.

"I know something happened, though she did not cause it, she was merely the recipient of the message." Xavier looked very serious.

_'A message? Who could send a message of that power that actually shifted the axis-mundi of the Earth?' _Dr. Strange asked worriedly.

"Athena, goddess of wisdom, from what I gather. But probably a little further afield than you are expecting," the bald mutant replied, feeling oddly elated for knowing more about a mystical event than his acquaintance.

_'Athena? The Greek Gods have not bothered with this world for ages. Even Hercules only wanders around getting drunk in bars,'_ the master of mysticism expounded.

"This Athena is not of our world, but a far off alternate reality. She was sending a last missive to her daughter who was sent to this place and time. And yes, I know she's a virgin goddess. Her daughter wondered exactly how that worked given it was the same on her former world. One that is now gone."

_'A whole world gone? No, I sense that you mean that reality is destroyed or damaged,'_ Dr. Strange said as he felt out the eddies of the situation.

"That is the impression I got as I muted the memories in one of the witnesses." Xavier actually shuddered slightly. "I am glad Rogue is a very strong personality."

That was when there was a knock at the door. "Chuck, we're back. You wanted to talk to Sheila before school, right?" Logan asked as he opened the door.

"Hello, sir. Sorry for causing a fuss." Sheila suddenly frowned and started looking around the room.

"Of course. I understand you have some stress right now, but try not to run across the United States again on a whim." Xavier noticed her looking around. "Is there a problem?"

"Sorry, I just feel like there is something here, but not something I can quite see. If that makes sense?"

Wolverine was now sniffing around himself. "Ain't nothing here, kid."

"Ah, you must be sensing my astral visitor. Dr. Strange, if you could let them see you?" Xavier asked the air to the left of him and up in the air.

The ghostly from of Dr. Strange appeared, his billowing, arcane cape swirling in an unseen wind. "Greetings, daughter of Athena."

"That's kinda cool," she said with wide eyes. "Is that Tibetan iconography? But the needlework on the edge of the cape is proto-Indian, while that amulet looks very Gaulic."

The mustached, mystical hero smiled. "Well, you've got quite the discerning eye. I need to determine if you are a mystical threat to this world."

"What does that entail?" the demigoddess asked.

"Just bathing you in the all-seeing eye of Agamoto," the sorceror replied.

"It just reveals truths?"

"It goes a bit beyond that, piercing all illusions and falsehoods." On his neck, the amulet's eye opened, bathing her in the brilliant light. After a long moment, the eye closed. "Well, you do not lie about your divinity, young demigoddess. I can also tell you are from an alien realm with items of great power bound to you. Now it is a matter of how to deal with you."

Sheila's eyes narrowed at that as Wolverine sensed she was ready to fight or flee. "What do you mean?"

"Your power could disrupt the mystical balance. I may need to bind your powers-"

"Do you always seek to maim refugees to your world, sorcerer? Because I will not be bound in such a way," she interrupted him with her harsh-toned words.

"Indeed, she is a student here and is just learning how to use her powers. While she is quite powerful, she is no danger. In fact, she seems to have a very good heart and a deep understanding of heroism," Xavier said. "I would defend any of my students that were threatened so without just cause."

Strange frowned at that. While he was sure that he could defeat her and possibly even Xavier, making an enemy of his old colleague was no part of his plans. "Yet I can not just allow you to run around unchecked," he noted.

"Why?" she countered. "I might be willing to curtail some of my actions, but I need more than just 'you need to'. I am more than capable of reasoning to figure this out with the proper information and frame of reference."

"It is not something so simple. I would have to explain in depth. In fact, I would have to teach you quite a bit about the mystical arts," he explained.

"I'm very smart, so I'm sure I can learn. I would be willing to listen to you and give weight to your words." Her blue-green eyes met his in challenge.

"I think that is very doable. Charles, you still have my address in New York?" Strange smiled at Xavier's nod. "Then how about this evening we take tea and discuss matters?"

"Okay. But I guess I have to go to school still," she said, giving Xavier a slightly frustrated look.

"Yes, I think its good for your socialization. Unless you are too tired from your cross country run?" the professor asked with a tilted head.

Sheila gave Logan a quick look. "No, I'm not sleepy and just a bit worn out from the run."

* * *

**Chapter 4: Speed, Spyke and More Speed.**

Sheila wandered down to breakfast a week later, giving a wave to the newest house guest and student. "Hello Evan," she mumbled. She sat down at the breakfast table as Kurt teleported in, waving her hand under her nose to ward off the stench of brimstone. "Kurt!" At least Xavier laid out a decent spread, being quite high class in quality.

"Sorry!" the blue-furred mutant said unrepentantly with a grin on his face.

"Hey, are we up for that Danger Room practice? You really are fast. Just like- Well, never mind," the skater 'dude' said. "I just need to train against you."

"Sure. Still don't want to talk about that guy that set you up?" Sheila had heard about this from Jean and Scott yesterday. Somehow Evan Daniels had been caught by the police for breaking into all the lockers at his school, even though his powers shouldn't have allowed for it.

It was only fifteen minutes later that they were all in the Danger Room in their uniforms, though Kitty was pulling on her gloves as she dashed in through the door.

"Sorry I'm late," the brunette said with a bit of blush. "Someone didn't wake me up until the last moment." She glared at Rogue.

"Not mah fault that you broke your alarm," Rogue replied without a trace of shame in her voice.

"Ladies, if you are ready. Now Rogue, you are going first. We'll have you do it unpowered and then we'll have you use a random drain to see how well you do," Logan called out from the control room up top of the bare metal room.

The green-loving girl scowled at going first, but she understood. Her powers really didn't work unless she had someone else. She did smile to herself as she hoped that she would get the chance to use Aegis's powers again. It would help with her history test. "Ah'm ready."

This was a fairly standard Danger Room obstacle course where it tried its best to pound, knock over or blast each of them. Rogue's first attempt was quite good, but the judicious use of powers allowed everyone to get to the end of the obstacle course faster. Even Spyke's run where he perforated several of the devices outdid her by thirty second. Aegis went last, as it had been discovered that her time typically deflated everyone else's efforts and they would not try as hard. Even working under her own self-imposed conditions, she made the whole course in only twenty seconds.

"Man, she gets some vertical movement with her speed. That's pretty wicked. She doesn't play sports at school?" Spky asked the rest of the team.

"That would so not be fair to everyone else," Aegis replied as she landed back at the starting line.

"Rogue, random chance says you get to have Aegis and Shadowcat's powers for your second run," Xavier called out as they reset the obstacle course.

Rogue grinned at that. "Ah'm ready, Professor." She pulled off her gloves must to her two target's apprehension.

* * *

"Hey, yo!" Todd called out as he hopped over to Sheila and Kitty.

"Hi, Todd. What are you up to?" the blonde asked.

He shrugged his hunched over shoulders. "Not much, just wanted you to know that things are heating up."

"Mystique getting antsy?" Sheila tilted her head towards the Principal's office.

"Huh? What are you talking about?" Kitty asked in confusion.

"Our principal is the shapeshifter Mystique, who seems to be gathering a group of mutants for her own purpose. Probably as some sort of counter to Xavier's Institute. Other than that, I don't know a whole lot. Your friend Lance along with Todd and Fred have been approached by her and transferred to Bayville High. Her motives are kinda obtuse," the Scion explained.

"I didn't know that," the girl from Illinois said, looking confused.

"Sheila's a buddy, she got no grief with me. But Mystique, she's really interested in Xavier and you guys," Todd said helpfully.

"I don't want you getting in trouble, but I appreciate you letting us know that something is up. Thanks, Todd." Sheila gave him a sunny smile. "See you around?"

"Sure, yo!" With that, he hopped off again.

"When were you going to tell us about Mystique?" Kitty demanded.

"I'm pretty sure I tried to. But you kinda blew Rogue and I off while you were listening to your tunes. Scott still isn't sure he believes us." Sheila shrugged at that. "And speak of the devil..."

Principal Darkholme looked like she was on the warpath. "What are you two doing here?"

"Explaining about your situation, Mystique. So you have three people that you've gathered?" Sheila asked, fishing for information.

Darkholme just smiled as she adjusted her glasses, looking quite normal and human in her guise. "You think you are so smart, don't you. Why don't you get to class before we see how many detentions I can fit in a day."

"Hey! No fair! We are just talking before class," the brunette girl said, sounding quite childish.

"We're leaving. See you around, Mystique." Sheila grabbed Kitty and started dragging her off. "I guess she knows to not tell Todd everything. She must have recruited more mutants for her cause. Perhaps that red-head in Mrs. Chalmers AP History class and that blonde that was hanging out with Lance the other day."

"Why do you suspect them?" Kitty asked as she shrugged out of Sheila grasp.

"They are new students," she replied simply.

"Hmm. Good point. Those are the only two new students. And coming in mid-year..." the mutant phaser thought as she started to engage her very bright brain. "I'll let Scott know."

"Me, too." Sheila moved quickly to Mrs. Chalmers class, giving the new girl Julia an unobtrusive close look while she sat down in the middle of the class. This was actually a class she had to read the book again, as certain details in history _were_ different, as she was sure there had not been Captain America, the Human Torch, Namor, the Angel, Spitfire, Namora, and Union Jack in her World War Two history before.

At the end of class, everyone was standing up. Sheila just 'happened' to bump into Julia. "Oh, you're the new girl. Principal Darkholme recruited you?"

The red-head glared. "Real subtle, X-Man. She didn't recruit me, she rescued me."

"That doesn't sound good. She rescued you?" Sheila asked in curiosity.

"Yeah, from flat-scan bigots wanting to make a human super-weapon," the girl said with a snarl, now that the room was mostly empty.

"Like Captain America?" The blonde tilted her head to give her a steady look. "Of course, he decided he was going to be a hero, didn't he?"

"Don't you dare judge me," the girl shouted, flinging out her hand to release a wide spray of psychic webbing that wrapped around her.

"I'm not the one attacking someone for being curious," Sheila noted as she shifted a bit. She should have probably dodge it, but she was getting too used to her invulnerability.

"You're a brat."

"I'm eleven. It goes with the territory or so I hear." Sheila suddenly flexed her muscles as hard as she could, snapping one of the webs.

Julia Carpenter just stormed out of the, letting the webbing fade, hiding how unnerved that anyone could affect her webbing.

"Way to make a good impression. But theory tested. Anyone new is likely recruited," Sheila muttered to herself as she headed to her next class.

* * *

Sheila sat cross-legged on an oriental rug in front of the master of mysticism who was also sitting cross-legged, but a foot in the air.

"You've improved a bit here, Sheila. You are still set on your public path of heroism?" the mystic hero asked.

"I have to have a legend to reach my apotheosis, doctor. And this is what my mother bade me to do as her last desire. I might not have been raised by her, but she did shape me." She had her eyes closed, trying to become even more at home with her supernatural senses. She could now, with a bit of effort, actually see astral projections.

"Yes, but that can disrupt the natural mystical balance," he said as he continued floating above the carpet.

"Which is fine, within reason. I have no intention of exerting an undue influence upon governments or businesses. Well, no more influence than any other hero or individual," she continued. "I don't intend to unleash armies of supernaturals to conquer reality or to bring back magic to the masses. That's not my style anyways."

"Yes, but even those actions will change things. Humanity is not ready to be reminded of magic and the supernatural to the degree you will force them to," Strange replied, continuing their debate even as they meditated.

"I'm sorry, humanity needs to pull its head out of the sand. Just because they've conveniently forgotten about the boogieman doesn't mean that he's forgotten about them. Willful ignorance is a cardinal sin, in my opinion. Humanity was quite able to exist in a world of supernatural wonders back when they could forge bronze."

The center sanctum of Doctor Strange looked something like an exotic library mixed with the back room of a museum. Wong opened the door. "Tea?" he asked as he carefully walked in with his platter.

"I'm fine. In fact, I should really be heading back. If you hadn't insisted on my being here, I was going to be at this game that has Spyke all riled up," the young demigoddess explained as she stood up as lithely as a panther. "Give the mansion a call when you want to have our next discussion?"

"Certainly," the master of the mystic arts said as he bowed his head slightly. Once she was out of the room and Wong had returned, he turned to his confidant. "I'm worried, Wong."

"What is the problem, master?" his servant and some-time apprentice of the arts asked.

"She is growing rapidly. From my research into myriad of tomes, she is gaining personal power almost as quickly as Hercules did at his height. Perhaps even faster, as this is a more active time of heroes. And with those items that she holds as her inheritance from her family, she carries nearly the power of a god already. She could disrupt the mystical balance of our Earth quite severely if she chose to." He floated up a little higher until he could easily stand up.

"Yes, but the same could be said of yourself, master. You hold the power to defend our realm, which means you could destroy it yourself. But we trust in you, for you have a strong heart that knows the truth," Wong said philosophically.

"Yes, well... and I don't want to cripple someone for merely being a refugee..." Strange said softly. Those words had cut him when she had accused him of wanting to cripple her for only being a threat.

* * *

Sheila slowed down as she hit the main streets of Bayville, finding a whole street of overturned cars. It looked like a disaster right out of a movie. Looking around, she shook her head (in a totally meaningless gesture) and shook her hair out to black and darkened her eyes to brown as her skin tanned. She then walked over to a policeman. "What happened?"

"Mutie scum, we think," the younger officer said, her mouth down-turned in a scowl.

"Now we don't know this was a mutant, though we've got a perp in jail," the older officer said with a hard look to his subordinate. "Now unless you can help us right these cars, you should move along."

"Um, actually, I should be able to help with the lighter vehicles." She gave them a wink and then picked up a sub-compact and carefully set it back up.

"Are you a... mutie- I mean, mutant?" the female officer asked in terror.

"Actually, nope, not a mutant. I'm more old school. Greek hero-type," the black-haired girl said as she moved over to the next car and tried to pick it up and carefully turn it over. It had been a larger vehicle, but still within her weight, though it was obvious it was a strain.

"So exactly where were you approximately an hour again?" the older, mustached officer named Robbins asked.

"New York, at a meditation class. I can give you the phone number for my teacher, if that helps," she replied promptly. Sheila looked dubiously at a SUV. It took a much greater effort to lift it and she could feel she had to expend some of her legendary essence to lift it. "That's probably about my limit. I hope their aren't any semi-truck tractors."

"Well, if you can get the cars back on their tires, the owners can at least get them towed to get repaired," the police detective said. "I appreciate your help, even if it is a bit unorthodox."

"No problem. Being a hero isn't _just_ hitting the badguys," she said with a bright smile as she moved to the third vehicle.

* * *

"Who is dis good Samaritan that helped the police last night?" Kurt asked as he happened to see the newspaper's front page as the professor read the paper.

"I'm actually interested in that myself," the professor asked as he continued to read the article where it spanned onto page A-10. "I'm not aware of any dark-haired girls with super-strength."

"Oh, that was me," Sheila said as between spoonfulls of cereal. "I just changed my hair color."

"Um, wig?" Scott asked, sharing a surprised look with Jean.

"I doubt it," the red-head said. "Her grandfather was known to be creative in shape-changing. Usually in his, uh, pursuits." Jean at least had the decency to blush there.

"Ja! That's right! So can you turn into animals, too?" the blue-furred mutant exclaimed as he popped over to grab a biscuit and then back to his seat.

"No, not yet. Of course, I'm just tapping the beginning of that power." She gave them a shrug, the rolled her eyes. She ran her left hand through her hair, turning it red. "This is fairly easy stuff, if you think about it."

"That could be useful at some point. It could be used for infiltration." Professor Xavier felt a twinge of jealousy, but squashed it quite easily. "So you were the one helping the police?"

"Someone left a lot of cars overturned. Insurance rates locally are going to be raising, I think."

"Yeah, that guy was a real pain," Scott admitted. "Luckily, Evan got the confession on tape that he was the thief and then we left him for the police."

"Unfortunately, it looks like he was broken out and all records pertaining to his capture were destroyed," Professor Xavier said with a frown as he put down the paper.

"You got that from the newspaper?" Kitty asked.

"No, Chief Robbins called him this morning with some veiled accusations," Ororo explained as she spread jam on her toast.

"He didn't have anything, but he was fishing," Logan said as he stabbed a few sausages from the plate with his claws instead of using his fork.

"Could be worse," Sheila said as she filled her plate. "Though I do worry about the new mutants that Mystique is recruiting. Julia said she was rescued from people that were trying to make super-human weapons."

"Yes, you mentioned that. I've put out some queries. If someone is out there trying to create mutants as weapons, we need to know about it." Xavier looked very frustrated and worried.

* * *

A limo drove past the Bayville Brotherhood Boarding House, slowing down only long enough for Mystique to step in. "Destiny. What was so important that it required you to break your cover to come to Bayville."

The older woman looked worried. "The futures I am seeing are becoming fragmented, especially with regards to the Rogue. There is something... no someone that is guiding her to her full potential. This is distorting everything. She can become a threat that the world can not deal with. Even Magneto will not be able to stand against the Rogue then."

"Who is this threat?" the shape-shifter demanded.

"The one known as Aegis. Her mind is allowing Rogue to learn how to handle her power far, far in advance of what should be. But beware, I don't see how you can destroy her. Something about this Aegis allows her to twist fate to her whims, so I can barely even see her." The blind woman shrugged helplessly in the back of the limo.

"Well then we will have to deal with in an aggressive manner. Driver, drop me off back at the Boarding House," Mystique called out to the driver.

She walked back up to the front door and slammed it open. "Brotherhood assemble!"

The ground almost seemed to shake as Fred Dukes came out of the kitchen from where he was doing dishes (at everyone else's insistence because he made so many dishes. "Oh, uh, Mystique? What's up?"

"Hey, yo! I'm here!" Todd Tolansky said as he bounded off three walls and landed like a toad would.

"Slow as always," Pietro Maximoff said with a smirk, appearing a second before in a blur.

Lance Alvers thumped down the stairs like any other teenager, taking in the identity of the shape-shifter.

Julia Carpenter nearly duplicated Todd's entrance actually, thought looking slightly less toad-like in her actions. The final mutant of the household wandered down the stairs, flipping her long, blonde hair over her shoulder; Regan Wyngarde.

"Good, you are all here. I have your first mission as the Brotherhood of Mutants," Mystique called out. "This will be a test to see how far you have come since I gathered you all here."

"Are we going to pound some flat-scans?" the red-headed girl asked, clenching her fists in anticipation.

"Even worse, apologists that want us to live and be part of humanity's cruelty against mutants. I'm sure you've seen the mutants that Xavier has gathered?" The shape-shifter knew they were not killers yet, but in the mass confusion she should be able to strike and remove the threat to her plans. "So we are going to draw them out by causing a disturbance at the junkyard."

* * *

"X-Men, to me!" Professor X called out from where he was working in his office at the Cerebro console. In moments all of his current students and teachers arrived.

Cyclops, Jean Gray, Nightcrawler, Aegis, Shadowcat, the Rogue, Spyke, Wolverine and Storm all showed up within five minutes.

"What's going on, Chuck?" Wovlerine almost growled.

"Cerebro has detected a disturbance. Multiple mutant signatures at the junk yard. It appears the Brotherhood is in motion at this point and I fear that we need to know what is going on. Wolverine, you are tactical leader."

Everyone quickly trooped down to the X-Van, though Wolverine actually took his motorcycle, Storm was going to just fly and Sheila was going to keep pace on foot.

"I wvish I had a better idea of the area, then I could teleport us all," Nightcrawler complained.

"Nothing wrong with the X-Van," Rogue countered.

"Other than it is getting a bit crowded," Shadowcat complained.

"We should probably look at a second X-Van if we keep expanding the team," Jean faux-whispered to the driver.

Cyclops nodded as he pulled out of the garage. "I know what you mean. It was just us for so long and now the whole mansion seems to be full."

The X-Men arrived to discover that the Brotherhood was busy smashing junked cars and generally causing a mess.

"Oh, hey! The X-Losers are finally here. Man, they are as slow as you and Toad are, Blob." Quicksilver zipped around. "They brought just about everyone, just like the boss lady said. You know what to do, team! Let's take them out!"

Spyke narrowed his dark eyes in anger as he hopped out of the back seat of the X-Van. "I'm going to take you down again!"

"Too slow," Quicksilver cat-called he zipped behind Spyke and rabbit punched him. "And this time I have a team to back me up, too!" He zipped around to the front and dodged several spikes.

Aegis's heart dropped as she realized that the speedster was far faster than she was. But perhaps she was fast enough if he wasn't expecting it. She leap-kicked at the Toad as a feint to move into position. "Sorry, changing partners." With that she suddenly charged at full speed behind the speed Quicksilver. With inhuman timing, she tripped him face-first into the dirt and before he could stand up, stomped his ankle. "Time out, Quicksilver."

Toad blinked as he realized what he saw. "Huh? When did she sprout super-speed?"

The Blob did a belly-bounce to knock Spyke away from him and into a wreck of a car. "I thought she had super-strength and toughness?" He winced as Cyclops blasted him with his concussion beam. "Hey!"

Wolverine was trying to claw at Arachne. The black and white spider-garbed girl was just as quick as the berserker was, but caught a kick as Nightcrawler appeared behind her.

Jean was pelting small debris at Avalanche, but he had managed to start shacking the earth, sending waves through the earth and a column of cars over at her, which Storm managed to blow out of the way with a gust of air.

A yard dog leaped silently from the shadows, transforming into Mystique and trying to hit Aegis in the back, but was tossed into a car with stunning force.

"A dog would have actually run at all the powers or if its training was good, would have started barking," the blonde demigoddess noted aloud.

"Very observant," the shape-shifter had to admit.

"Ahm going to stop you cold," Rogue promised as she ran up with one of her gloved hands uncovered.

Mystique just side-stepped and then with a complicated trip that turned into a throw, tossed the power-draining mutant right into an open window of a junked car. "Stay there, little girl. I have something to do." She charged at the blonde.

Aegis for her part was ready, almost bouncing on her feet when a burst of red energy hit her dead on. She was actually plowed right through two rusted and dented SUVs. She ended up under a car that toppled on top of her.

"I got her!" Cyclops called out. "Stay down, Mystique."

"Scott, why did you blast Aegis?" Jean called from overhead.

"What are you talking about? I blasted Mystique!" Cyclops called out.

The red-headed telepath realized instantly what was going on. "There's an enemy telepath controlling you. Cyclops, fight it off like the professor taught you." Jean then started cautiously feeling out the enemy even as she enacted her own mental defenses. "There!" With a wave of telekinetic force she knocked the hidden Lady Mastermind off her feet. Mud splattered over her black and purple bodysuit and into her blonde hair.

"Too late, X-Men," Mystique crowed as she slid a square, metal package under the shaking car that was lifting up. She dove behind another car as a huge explosion let off, making a twenty foot crater and sent the car flying over fifty feet into the air. She smiled cruelly. "Brotherhood, we are done here."

"Sheila!" the Toad shouted, bounding over. "I thought we were just smacking these X-jerks around!" He looked very upset.

"I appreciate that you didn't know her plan, Todd," Aegis said as she shot out of the smoke, holding a hand over her mouth. "But that level of force just can't work as it didn't hurt at all. I don't take kindly to people trying kill me though." Her leg shot out in a kick at super-speed, barely blocked by Mystique even as the bones creaked under the hit.

"Whoa! That was cool," Avalanche called out as he knocked Wolverine and Cyclops over with a shock-wave through the ground.

The shape-shifter was thinking furiously. That had been her heaviest trap. And Cyclops eye-beams where nothing to sneeze at either. "Brotherhood, retreat! I have to rethink this attack."

"I think I want to have a chat about why you want me dead," Aegis called out as she charged over at shape-shifter.

"Kitty!" Spyke shouted. "She's hit hard!" He was checking her for head wounds.

"Oh no!" Jean called out, getting distracted from her mental duel with Lady Mastermind.

The young demigoddess skidded over to Kitty's side. "Just a concussion and a light scalp wound. She'll be fine."

"Vwhoa! Fast diagnosis," the blue-furred mutant exclaimed as he almost jumped backwards.

"She'll be out for a bit, but she is not in any danger." Aegis looked around, frowning. "And most of the Brotherhood have disappeared already."

"Well, it's not like we don't know where they live or where they are," Cyclops said as he walked up, holding his right arm.

"Just a sprained shoulders and a bone-bruise... and brain damage?" Aegis exclaimed as she gave him a quick look her supernatural ability to sense physical ailments.

"But I didn't get hit in the head," he countered.

"Or its a really old head wound. Nerve damage doesn't heal as well as other wounds," Sheila replied as she thought things through. "That may give us a clue on how to help your optic blast control."

"Oh, Scott! Maybe we can finally figure out a way for you to control your optic blasts," Jean said as she gave him a quick hug.


	2. Enemies and Allies

**Chapter 5: Lost Cubs**

"Sheila! Sheila!" Kurt called out as he ran up looking quite normal and 'human.' "You vwon't believe vwhat I found!" It was during the middle of school lunch and the students from Xavier's were sitting around a table with the only notable absence being Jean who was sitting next to Duncan. Across the way, the Brotherhood was watching them with angry glares from the fight over a week ago.

"Oh? What did you find out?" she asked as she looked up from her college level medical book.

"It's a laboratory in the basement that tried to blow itself up!" the holograph-covered mutant exclaimed.

"You have got to be kidding? Why would our school have something like that?" Evan said in surprise. He then went back to munching on his sandwich but watching Kurt closely.

Sheila slipped her thick book into her backpack. "Well, I'm up for looking at it."

Rogue, Kitty and Evan all followed Kurt and Sheila down to a locked and sealed off sub-lab even below the normal section. There was a bit of smoke, but it was exiting out the cracked open window.

The supernatural girl frowned as she had the sensation that she was being watched. She stopped in the middle of the room as the other kids started rummaging around in the crates.

"Wow, these are vintage computers," Kitty called out as she poked around a smoking computer case.

"Yeah, it was the one with a recorded message that told me the self-destruct was activating," the teleporting mutant said with a nervous laugh.

"This did that? These computers look like they are from the 70's. I wouldn't have thought they could do that," the brunette said in confusion.

"What'cha doin', Sugah?" Rogue asked as she looked up from where she was poking at a strange device about the size of a breadbox.

"I sense someone here. So I'm trying to meditate and open my inner eye like Dr. Strange has been training me to access my astral self. Ah, there _is_ a person there," the young demigoddess said, then opened her eye and looked over.

The dimensionally trapped Native-American snorted at that. _'And my eyes are blue,'_ he said in his trapped space as he leaned up against the wall. At least she was slightly more visible than most of the 'ghosts' that people became as they walked around the school.

"No, your eyes look brown, actually," Sheila replied directly as she looked at him. She had achieved the level where here astral self could detect him.

_'Holy crap, you can see me?'_ the young-looking man asked.

"It's a little hard, but yes I can see you. My name is Sheila," she offered as she seemed to talk to the air, not noting that Roque was doing the same meditation exercise that she had.

_'Call me Forge. I was a student here and accidentally trapped myself in an N-Dimension that I created with that device your Goth friend was poking around with.'_ Forge seemed quite shocked.

"How come ah can only hear him?" Rogue complained.

"What?" Evan said as he pulled his head out of a crate. "You can hear that weird, spooky ghost shit?" The African-American seemed quite shocked.

"Whoa, seeing and hearing ghosts. That's really cool!" Kitty called out as she walked over.

_'So if you can reset that device, I might be able to escape the artificial N-Space and go home,'_ the inventor explained.

"This created an entire spacial dimension that your are trapped in? How do we collapse the space-time and get you out?" the demigoddess asked him as he turned the device over and around while making sure not to hit any buttons.

_'Just reset it first. I'd rather not find out what it is like being the first person collapsed through 5-dimensional space.'_ Forge actually looked over at Rogue in confusion. Meditation could allow someone to see him?

"Ah do believe ah got it. He looks pretty young, like he's in school still," Rogue said as she studied the figure.

"Great, the X-Men _are_ insane," Pietro said as he led the Brotherhood down into the basement lab. "What is this place?"

_'This is my lab. They blocked it off after I disappeared into N-Space thirty years ago. Who are these guys?'_ Forge asked the two girls.

"Just a lab that got blocked off thirty years ago. You guys must be bored if you are following us down here," Sheila replied as she kept an ear out for the Native-American and the Brotherhood. It was harder than it looked.

"We just want to make sure you aren't planning an ambush," Regan said with narrowed eyes.

"I thought that was more your speed?" Kitty sniped back nastily. "After all, you were the ones that led us into a trap so that your leader could try and kill one of us."

"Naw, Mystique explained that she was really just trying to test all of yous," Todd explained from where he was crouched down. "She had heard from Fred how tough Sheila was."

"That was awfully lethal though. Mah memories from Mystique don't match up with what you are saying," the striped-haired girl said as she leaned against the wall.

Julia looked a bit concerned at that, while Regan just smiled.

"We were just showing up to pound some sense into you flat-scan apolo- apologists," Lance said, smacking his fist into the palm of his other hand.

"Yeah, how can you back humans over mutants?" Pietro in between flickering from area to area of the room.

_'He has powers like me?'_ Forge asked in surprise.

"What are you talking about?" Evan asked aggressively. "Heck, what is a flat-scan?"

"Sounds like a derogatory term for non-mutants," Kurt replied, looking quite angry. "You know, not all non-mutants are bad. My foster parents accepted me even with the vway I truly look."

"What about the ones that do? What would you do against the ones that experiment on mutants?" the Brotherhood red-head asked in an angry tone.

"Like the ones-?" Sheila drawled out.

"Yeah, like the ones that experimented on me," she snapped out.

"I guess you could tell us who they were and see what we do?" the demigoddess suggested right back.

That caused the Brotherhood to look among themselves.

"Sounds like she's saying show 'em or fold," Fred finally said, looking at the much shorter girl on his team.

"Fine." Julia looked nearly murderous. "It was the Brand Corporation. Project Ascendancy ran by Glen Barker."

"So, uh, you guys want to help us rescue this ghost from being trapped in some other dimension?" Kitty asked.

_'Because I'd really like to be rescued,'_ the lost teen said with a laugh.

"How do we know he even exists?" the blonde-haired Regan asked imperiously. "He could just be a prank you are trying to pull."

"You are the telepath, right? The one that can do mental illusions?" Rogue asked with a glare as she lost her concentration. "So read Sheila's or mah mind and project what we are seeing."

"What, you trust me to do that?" Regan asked with a sneer on her pouty lips.

"We _are_ asking you to trust us, after all," Sheila noted. "Or don't you guys want to rescue a trapped mutant?"

Forge blinked as he took in the term mutant. _'Mutant?'_

"Fine." Regan closed her eyes and probed the two girl's minds. After a moment, a ghostly figure appeared in the center of the room. "Well, you at least _think_ he's there."

"Um, does that mean you guys can all see me now?" Forge asked, looking around. To him, everyone but Rogue and Sheila were fading in and out of existence.

"Yo," Todd called out, giving the Native-American a wave. "You are _really _lost, kemo sabe."

"Oh, great. I'm able to talk to someone and the first thing I get was racist injun jokes," he said while mock-waving his fist at Todd, then started laughing. "I'll take even that. Man, it's great to be visible."

"So about this dimensional projector? I don't think it has enough power curve to shunt you back to reality. Can it handle an external power source to stabilize the dimensional interface?" Sheila asked carefully as she continued to examine the odd device.

"What'd she say?" Fred asked while looking flummoxed.

"I don't know," the toad-like Todd replied looking really weirded out.

Julia and Regan shared a strained look. The red-head looked over at Kitty. "I thought she was the bruiser of your team?"

"Um, she's some sort or genius. She won't let me slack off," the brunette groused as she pouted.

"Ah don't get to neither," Rogue acknowledged as she folded her arms around her torso and leaned against the wall.

"Say, that thing run on AC or DC?" Lance asked curiously.

"Looks DC," Sheila said while poking her finger at it.

"How much power are we talking about," the mechanically inclined earth-shaker asked. "I could run some cable down here from my jeep for DC easy."

"Should only need about 500 watts," Forge explained with a gesture.

It was only a half an hour to cobble the adaptors and a small amplifier. With a last adjustment, Sheila hit the big button on the dome-like device and with a crackle of unearthly energies, opened a port into Forge's artificial dimension. The illusion stepped through the portal, which closed right behind him.

"Thanks guys! It's been a long thirty years," the Native American admitted. He carefully moved over to the young Kurt and took his right hand to shake it profusely. "You saved my life."

Sheila finished powering down the device. "And you don't appear to be rapidly gaining all those years of lost age. Now we have our alibi for why we missed the first part of the fourth period."

Regan narrowed her gray eyes, then looked over to Rogue. "So she always thinks three steps ahead?"

"Usually, Sugah. She even rubs off on mah thanks to mah power to drain mah target. It's a a real rush. Ah _think_ it even helps with mah grades after the powers wear off," the 'skunk-head' replied.

"That is so not fair!" Kitty exclaimed as she tensed up and clenched her fist at her thighs.

Regan then sent an illusionary shock into Sheila's hand from the device, causing her hand to twitch from the pain. She just mockingly smiled at the younger blonde's heated glare. "Come on, guys. Let's catch up to Pietro. We've done our good deed for the decade."

"That's going to be a problem," Sheila said after they left. "She's figured out that I'm not immune to psychic attacks."

"Was, wirklich?" Kurt exclaimed in shock.

"Yes, really. So I can expect another attack from them and another accident from Mystique."

* * *

"Are you sure about this, Chuck?" Logan asked as he walked towards his motorcycle in the garage. "I should be around in case the Brotherhood attack again." He was all suited up and ready for action of a covert sort, so in leathers and carrying his helmet.

"We need you to investigate the Brand Corporation, Logan. If Julia is correct, they are experimenting on mutants. And that's not something we can ignore," the bald mutant said from his wheel chair. "I want you to stay in touch every day. The project is in Queens, so very close indeed. It must be shielded somehow."

"Don't you worry. I'm going to figure this out and if need be rescue them," he said with a growl.

"If we can, Logan, we need to break this so that the people behind this atrocity can't hide in the shadows." Xavier looked like he was concentrating very heavily on the issue. "If you need us, the X-Men are ready to assist."

"You should get back to that special training you are doing with Sheila. I'm not sure she's right about Mystique, but if she is she needs all the tricks in her bag she can use." He kick-started his motorcycle and spun out.

Xavier nodded as he started to wheel back to the main house. "Good luck, old friend."

* * *

"Ooh! Get away, stink-bomb! I thought you smelled better, so I was thinking of even going out with you. My mistake, I can still smell you when I get close," one of the girl's at Bayville High said after school a week later. "Why don't you just go back to the garbage heap you roll in?"

That got a laugh out of her friends as they crushed Todd's illusion that they might have been interested. In the shadows behind him, Regan Wyngarde snickered quietly as she released the illusionary smell that drove off the girls after making them think that the Toad was desirable. She loved her illusionary powers.

Ten minutes later, Todd was sniffing at his shirt. "I don't really smell bad anymore, do I?" he asked Fred.

The gigantically fat boy with a blond Mohawk looked at Todd and sniffed very carefully. "Man, you reek today. I thought you showered this morning?"

"Yeah, Todd? I thought you were becoming Mr. Suave? I was figuring that you and your tongue were going to be very popular. Though you might want to bath more often than twice a week," Lance said as he backed up from the illusionary smell.

Todd shook his head and really wondered if these guys really were the best friends he could get. "Whatever, dudes. I'm outta here." He hopped over to the 'X-Men' table. "Yo, Sheila? Got a moment?"

"Sure, Todd. What is up?" She looked at him, but out of her peripheral vision saw Regan duck around the corner.

The hunched over mutant almost felt he could hear laughter in the background. "Uh, can we talk after school privately? I don't wanna talk about it here." In his eyes, he could see Scott, Evans and Kurt actually hiding the urge to laugh at him while Kitty and Sheila were wrinkling their noses. He cringed and took a step back, even as the scent grew stronger to the people.

Thinking quickly, Sheila asked, "How about at Valiant Grove?"

"Sure. See ya." With that, he hopped off quickly.

Sheila waited until she saw Regan wander off. "Well, it looks like Mystique is having Lady Mastermind be her cats paw."

"So what are you going to?" Scott asked.

"Spring their trap, of course."

* * *

Sheila ran up to where Todd was waiting in 'civilian' garb, even if she did have the light-weight armor cloth X-Men uniform underneath the long-sleeve shirt and jeans. She had a short jacket on with a few things that might help her just in case. The trees of Valiant Grove Park made it an ideal place for privacy... just in case. "Hey, Todd? What's up?" she called out casually.

"You gotta help me! I thought I was finally getting somewhere with Kimberly but then my, uh, B.O. problem got worse today," the sandy-haired mutant said as he hopped over to her.

"You are washing daily, right?"

"Well, every other day. Those soaps are expensive, man. And it itches a bit." He actually scratched himself under his arms.

"Might have to look at getting a creme or lotion that will soothe that." Sheila heard the creak of the Blob's tendons and bent to the side slightly. When the fist brushed past her ear, she turned it into a super-powered throw. "Gee, Mystique, a second sneak attack? This is getting repetitive."

"Huh? What?" Todd asked as he looked around frantically.

Quicksilver blurred forward under the illusionary invisibility, rapid fire punches into her face. "You can't see me, but I can pound you!'

Sheila was sent skidding backwards. "Why are you doing this? It's not like I attack you guys 'just because' you know!" Even after being punched dozens of times and being flung fifty feet, she was still on her feet. She focused and tried to push out the alien, telepathic influence like she had been practicing with Xavier _and_ Strange. All of the Brotherhood became slightly visible to her.

The Blob jumped into the air to do a super-body-slam, which Sheila rolled underneath. "X-Men... Now!" She suddenly charged towards Lady Mastermind, but Archane leaped at her with her own super-agility.

"I thought she couldn't see us?" the red-headed mutant called out as she grappled with the girl.

"She's fighting the illusion already?" the illusionist asked worried.

That was when Nightcrawler appeared with Cyclops and Rogue, then the teleporter disappeared again. An abrupt wind kicked up as Storm made her presence known overhead.

Mystique frowned from behind a tree. This was really not working half as effectively as she had expected. It appeared the blonde X-Men was quite tricky and had planned accordingly.

Nightcrawler reappeared with Shadowcat and Jean, both of them charging at other targets. Nightcrawler then went of after the civilian dressed Toad.

"Hey! Why are you attacking me? I didn't know nothing," the hygiene impaired mutant asked as he leaped away.

"Likely story," the German mutant declared as he teleported and then leaped at the Toad from behind.

"No, Nightcrawler, he really didn't," Sheila called out as she weathered a furious storm of super-speed punches from Quicksilver.

"Beam-boy! You don't have Mr. Claw around to protect your back," Arachne called out as she dodged around Cyclop's blasts to kick him in the chest.

"You'll find out the X-Men don't have to have Wolverine around to do our fighting," he replied as he tucked and rolled, sending out another crimson beam the moment he was back on his feet.

The ground rumbled as Avalanche concentrated on shaking everyone off their feet, but the telekinetic punches from Jean knocked him for a loop. The Blob was throwing a large boulder into the air to try and hit Storm, but she was just a bit too quick.

Mystique ran out of the bushes, throwing several grenades at the blonde X-Men. "Quicksilver, contain this gas around her!" she ordered as they exploded in purple smoke.

"Right!" the silver-haired mutant called out, blurring off around the area to encircle Sheila in the gas. It was thick enough you could barely see the young girl.

"Leave her alone!" Rogue shouted as she tried to grab the speedster, but he was too fast for her. "Sheila!"

The shapeshifter frowned as she realized that she wasn't hearing any coughing. "Damn it, she's immune to gas too?"

"Don't you ignore me," Shadowcat called out as she dove through a tree to tackle Mystique to the ground, knocking the wind from the older woman.

That was when Sheila reappeared as she leaped out of the gas while palming her gas mask into her jacket, gaining over fifty feet in an instant and then... hovering! "Oh, now I finally figure out how to fly," the girl groused.

"Whoa?" Todd called out as he bounced off three trees. "How come she has so many powers?"

"That is a good question, Toad. Get off me, girl," Mystique snarled as she kicked the smaller Shadowcat off of her. She then flipped to her feet and charged over to leap at Jean Gray. "Lady Mastermind... Now!"

The young illusionist smirked as she finished sinking her mental claws into Sheila, suddenly unleashing deadly trick images of being pecked and clawed at by monstrous birds.

"Ack!" Sheila tried to fly away, even as she tried to fight off the illusion. She bounced off two trees and the Blob before she skidded into the ground. Psychic sympathetic wounds appeared with each scratch. It was literally a death of a thousand cuts from her own mind. "Glamorbreak," she hissed out, activating the hypnotic trap within her mind that she had Professor X place there.

Lady Mastermind screamed as she was violently thrown out for a second, then just smirked at her target. "That only slowed me down for a second."

"But now I know where you are." Sheila raised her fist, then snapped it open as if she were pushing her away. She unleashed the perverse reversal of her healing power, causing bruising wounds to appear all over the psychic member of the Brotherhood. "You aren't the only one that can hurt without touching a person."

"This isn't an illusion. How?" her blonde opponent said in shock. Then she just smiled through her bruises. "But you didn't take me out. Now it's my-"

"Stay away from her! Ah'm warning you!" Rogue shouted, suddenly streaking across the ground and then kicking Lady Mastermind with super-human strength that sent her flying into the bushes.

"No! She's learned to harness the powers she has stolen!" Mystique declared in a horrified voice. "This is too early." It was time to beat a hasty retreat. She ducked around a tree and turned into a cat that ducked under the roots.

"Hey, Quicksilver? Take a tahme out," the power-absorbing mutant called out, suddenly blasting with Cyclop's optic blasts... with super-accuracy.

"Ooph," the blue and silver clad mutant called out as he was sent pinwheeling across the ground.

"Are you all right, Aegis?" Cyclops asked.

"I'm fine, the gas wasn't able to affect me." Thank to using a gas-mask, but she would let them assume she was actually invulnerable to poisons with her trick. "I think I've figured out why Mystique wanted me stopped. Rogue was able to use my super-intellect to advance her understanding of her own powers so she can use her borrowed powers at will," Aegis called out.

"That witch didn't want me controlling my powers?" Rogue said, sounding betrayed and angry.

"You being able to use any power you've ever absorbed is _scary_, Rogue. And you mentioned that your old guardian was working for Mystique, so it sounds like you were important to her nefarious plans." Sheila was glaring at the Blob as she tried to ignore the pain from her mentally inflected wounds.

"Guys, this ain't right," Todd called out. "I didn't sign up with the Brotherhood to attack friends."

"She ain't my friend," the gigantically fat Blob snapped out. "I still owe her for breaking my pinky. I've been practicing hard to get ready for this fight."

"No, Toad's right, Blob. We signed up to protect ourselves from humans, not to attack mutants just because someone said so." Arachne was looking around carefully. "Looks like Mystique has taken off anyways." She had a sinking sensation that they had been used.

"We can take them," Quicksilver said as he reappeared again in a blur.

"Then you can do it on your own. I'm outta here," Todd Tolansky called out, hopping away.

"I'm not in for this sort of thing either. A good rumble, that's cool. Trying to kill someone for figuring out their powers? That's uncool." Avalanche turned and walked off himself.

"I'm with them," Arachne called out. "Good luck fighting them when you are outnumbered."

Quicksilver and the Blob both realized they were right. It was just the two of them and the unconscious Lady Mastermind. In a blur, Quicksilver picked up the heavily beaten girl and disappeared.

"Gangway!" the Blob yelled out in a panic, rushing off while knocking over a tree.

"Sheila, are you okay, sugah?" Rogue asked worriedly.

"I should heal quickly," she said in assurance. "Can you remember what Mystique wanted you for?"

The other X-Men had gathered around her. Storm put her hand on Rogue's shoulder.

"Ah do. Ah'm was suppsed to be her ace in the hole against Xavier _and_ Magneto." Using Sheila's super-human recollection ability on Mystique's memories was tricky, but doable. "She's got some weird feelings hooked up to me. She's even my legal mother by adoption." Rogue looked furious and confused all at once.

"So Rogue Darkholme? Good grief, that's like out of some fantasy novel," Shadowcat asked.

"I'm just Rogue," the power-absorbing X-Men declared. "She's just the woman that is trying to use me."

"Rogue, I think you need to be careful with how many people you absorb. If you are remembering all their memories and emotions, you are going to have to build up your self-identity to be much stronger to ward them off," Sheila said suddenly.

"Ah see what you mean. That means more meditation. Ah hate meditation," she grumped and shook off Storm's hand on her shoulder.

"Better than going nuts, fräulein," Nightcrawler said with a laugh. "At least Wolverine can't just say 'more Danger Room exercise to force you to control your power!'"

"Ah'd almost rather be forced to do that, elf."

* * *

**Chapter 6: Experiments**

Inside a top-secret research lab, a ceiling air-vent cover popped open to let an orange-brown and black wearing mutant drop to the ground in a crouch. He started sniffing even as he disappeared into a shadow only moments before two security guards walked around a corridor in the high-tech hallway.

Wolverine followed them cautiously, listening in.

"Did you ever hear what they are doing in Lab C?" the first guard asked, his stun rifle slung across his shoulder casually.

"You don't want to stick your nose in there. Your security clearance isn't high enough. It's hush-hush stuff."

"And that Doctor Zabu give the creeps too?" the first guard mused.

"If he _doesn't_ give you the creeps, something is wrong." The second guard had what he thought of as a very masculine mustache, but it barely helped his slight build.

"Gangway! Move it!" shouted a group of medics trundling a medical crash gurney. "One of the subject in Lab C is going into cardiac rest."

The two guards ducked to the side as the gurney screamed past on wheels with bearings that could use some oil.

"Zabu is really pushing those genetic activation treatments," an orderly complained bitterly.

"Did... did that guy have golden skin?" the first guard gasped. It wasn't a golden tan but his skin looked to be made of shiny, polished gold.

Wolverine had seen enough. This place had to be shut down and hard. Now it was time to call in the heavy calvary.

* * *

Two hours later, a dark figure crept across a ceiling in ways that contravene of normal rules of physics. That was when he heard the sound of a beast roaring in anger.

"You bastards killed them! RAUGH!" Wolverine shouted as he leaped at two of three guards for Brand Corp., slicing their way through guns and with a reverse swipe, sliced the tendons on the back of the hands.

One of the guards screamed like a wounded pig.

Then Wolverine saw a blur of a man in a red and blue costume with a spider theme... boot first. With a twip of web spinnerets, he suddenly found himself stuck to a wall. "What the hell!" He was lucky one of his arms was not fully stuck to the wall.

"No filleting people! It's an unwritten rule in Queens!" Spidey quipped as he bounced over to punch Wolverine in the head, bouncing his metal-skulled head off the wall with a clang that seemed to stun Wolverine and left his own knuckles hurting. "Oh? You must be a robot or something then."

"Wolverine!" Nightcrawler called out. Just like he was trained though, he hit a button on his headphone. "Wolverine is down, taken out by a guy in red and blue. I am engaging!" With a bamf of brimstone and smoke, he appeared right behind Spider-Man, only to get punched as if he knew where he was going to appear.

"Deodorant is your friend," Spider-Man quipped as he theatrically waved his hand..." And cutting back on the beans might help too." Then he suddenly darted away from the wall he had been standing by.

He had been expecting to see someone like the Rhino come through the wall, so when a petite young girl came through it like she was some ghost, he was a bit surprised.

"Wolverine! Nightcrawler!" the girl shouted out, even as she tried to punch the already moving Spider-Man.

"How many of you are there?" the wall crawler asked as he landed on a wall. He tried to web her up, but she just let it pass through her as if she were just an illusion. Just a second later and he dodged again, leaping towards a figure that was blasting out at him with red beams of concussive force. "Whoa! Watch the property damage dude! What do they call you? The Blasternator? Eye-Beam? Oh! I know... the Red Zapper!"

"It's Cyclops," the uptight teen snapped back. "This must be another one like Arachne! Take him down, X-Men!"

"Like who? Is someone infringing on my Trademark?" Spidey quipped even as he dodged two blasts.

One of the blasts hit the wall next to Wolverine and Shadowcat, sending fragments that she barely phased through. "Oh no!" She phased to start pulling a few fragments from him, seeing the wounds heal as she watched.

Spider-Man dodged between the really too accurate attacks from Cyclops, having to hop, spin and crouch (on the floor and roof at times) while moving closer. Finally he got close enough and punched the skinny teen to knock him out. "Sheesh, we should call him Demolition-Man. Or maybe D Man."

"Get away from Cyclops!" Jean Grey called out as she flew around the corner, Storm at her side and followed on the ground by Spyke. With a wave of her hand she tried to knock him back, only to blink as he somehow dodged the invisible wave and a set of bone spikes from Spyke.

"You must be Mind Maid!" Spidey said in his too-funny manner that could infuriate someone into a blind rage. "You must be the sidekick of Cape-girl. Though Spine Boy has the tough-guy punk look that most thugs sport." His spider-sense was screaming that they were incredibly dangerous, when it blared twice as strong out from the other way.

In a double-blur, Rogue and Aegis zipped around from the backside.

"Super-speedster... well, not twins, anyways." Spidey had bounced to the ceiling and tried to web them both up, only to see them both dodge and duck between the webs. "Hey! That's my shtick you are infringing on! Only I'm allowed to dodge my foes attacks like they are standing still."

"Spider-Man was created by this mutant experimentation project?" the demigoddess asked in consternation.

"Ah thought he was a good guy?" Rogue asked even as she blasted out with Cyclop's optics beams.

"Whoa? What are you? Copy Girl?" the red and blue garbed hero asked as his spider-sense went into over drive. "And I am too a good guy! I'm even here to rescue some random guy named Paul that kidnapped." Not one of his classmates. Nope, couldn't say that.

"You have no idea what you are neck deep into, do you?" Aegis asked as she bounced off two walls and then the ceiling. Then she saw Spider-Man dodge out of the way of an attack that she had just thought of and then implemented. "Precognitive? That really would make it much easier to dodge, wouldn't it?"

_That_ actually startled Spidey. "How did you figure that out? Most people just think I'm very quick." Actually, no one was trying to beat him up this moment so he stayed stuck to a wall. "Um, can we talk about this for a second?"

"Yes. Spider-Man is known to be a hero, even if the Daily Bugle makes him out to be a villain," Storm called out. "We are here to rescue the latent mutants from evil experimentation."

"That means saving them from people that think their lives are worth less than a humans', kid," Wolverine said from where he was being phased through Spider-Man's webs by Shadowcat. "I've already found two bodies."

"Two _what!_" Peter Parker was a moral person, for the most part. He had come here after finding out that one of his fellow students had disappeared. It had actually taken two weeks of tracking him down.

"Up and at 'em, you two," Sheila said as she healed Cyclops and Nightcrawler.

"Vat hit me?" Nightcrawler asked as Shadowcat phased him through his webbing bonds.

"Me, actually. Sorry about that. I thought you were some villains." Spider-Man was actually quite tense. "So really, I'm sorry about knocking some of you guys out."

"Just means we all need more training," Wolverine grated out. "Rescue first."

They all moved into the locked lab, as the rest of the level had already been cleared out. Wolverine sliced the locking mechanism of the four foot wide door even as Rogue kicked open the door.

It was a large central room with locked rooms behind armored glass. Several doctors were at computers when Aegis ran up and grabbed the leader's wrist. "It's too late to hide your evil actions. I hope you rot in prison," she hissed at them angrily.

The lead doctor looked amused. "Fascinating, more enhanced humans. And you brought Spider-Man. I always have wondered what circumstances gave him his powers and set him on the path he travels."

"Ahn't you a mutant, sugar?" Rogue asked the young teen that was not on their team.

"Um, no? That's like not bad, is it?" Spider-Man said quickly. "And wait... you mean all your powers are genetic mutations? Okay... not sure how shooting laser beams out of your eyes fits as an adaptation to your environment."

With his free hand Doctor Zabu pulled out an inhaler and breathed in a dark purple mist. Suddenly his body started to change and taken on a Herculean shape. His face also distorted and became more savage. A twisted smile formed on his face and forced his way out of Sheila's grip.

"Still think you can put me in prison?" the bulked up scientist sneered.

Aegis punched him in the face. The force of the blow knocked Zabu back.

"Talk about your Mr. Hyde," Spider-Man remarked as he started webbing up the other scientists before they could start wiping their computers.

"As good a name as any," the newly named alter ego admitted. He then lashed out with a punch at Sheila that she blocked.

"It tickles," Aegis noted to Hyde's great surprise.

"Rogue! Double team," Cyclops called out just like in training. "One... Two!"

Double red beams of concussive force lashed out at the huge man, sending him caroming into an armored cell. That did not seem to do a lot other than anger the brutish looking super-villain.

"His body is purging the chemical he pumped into him. If we just keep beating on him for ten more minutes, it will wear off," Aegis called out as she punched him hard in the back right where his left kidney was.

Storm nodded, even as she unleashed a lightning bolt that the big man ducked. With brutish cunning, Hyde realized that he was severely outnumbered and needed... leverage. Dashing forward, he snatched at Jean and Shadowcat. The red-head floated overhead, but Shadowcat was caught by her neck.

"I've got this girl! Make any sudden moves and I snap her neck like a twig!" he bellowed to them all.

"Bub, you shouldn't have done that," Wolverine snarled even as Shadowcat phased through his hand.

"Oh, crud," Hyde said succinctly as the berserker charged at him and slashed at him. He barely raised his arms, but the cuts were very bad even in spite of that. In desperation, he punched Wolverine so hard that he dented a wall. "I'll just kill you all!"

Aegis could feel the ichor sing within her blood as she suddenly realized the perfect way to neutralize the mutate. "I'm an idiot! Of course!" She then purged the drug from his body, suddenly reverting him to just Zabu. "Remove all poisons and drugs from his system and he's helpless."

"What sort of mutation was that?" Spidey asked as he quickly webbed up the scientist.

"I'm not a mutant," the blonde girl replied in a suddenly shy manner, surprising him.

Rogue frowned as she realized she did not have that power. "That's new, ahn't it?"

"Ja! I'm sure she is still allowed to improve her powers!" Nightcrawler called out from where he and Spyke had been helping free the prisoners.

"Let's finish up here before the police arrive," Storm called out.

* * *

The X-Men and Spider-Man were watching the police, FBI and other various officials raid the building.

Shadowcat was studying the masked teen. "So are you are not a mutant, but you have mutant-like powers?"

Storm actually looked over, then nodded. "He might be what Professor X considers to be mutates. Artificially activated latents. He's been wanting to talk to one for a long time."

"Still doesn't quite make sense with classic Darwinian biology," Spidey muttered to himself where he was crouched on a wall. "But what you are talking about sort of makes sense with what happened to me. I was bitten by a radioactive spider. The next day I woke up super-strong, able to cling to walls and shoot webs from my wrists (which is way much better than where spiders really have their spinnerets, by the way.) So being a mutate actually is reasonable." He looked over at the other 'non-mutant'. "Wait a second. If she's not a mutant or a mutate like me, what is she?"

"Oh, I'm a demigoddess," Aegis replied with a totally straight face while trying to keep a blush from her face.

"No, really, you can tell me," the spider-themed hero remarked. "Though if you did find your powers at the bottom of a box of cereal I'd like to know what brand it was."

"Sugah, she's not joking. Ah've seen her ignore tons of metal and let it bounce off her head like it was a ping-pong ball," Rogue said with a smile on her face.

"Really? And so the name Aegis is about-?" Spidey asked.

"Being invulnerable. Just like that Classical hero. I suspect that I gained my invulnerability from nearly the same method."

"That is so unfair," the intrepid hero muttered.

Spyke just chuckled. "We're a team though."

"Spyke is right. I was attacked by the Brotherhood recently and they could have easily defeated me. I might be physically invulnerable, but psychic attacks hurt. But enough about me. Would you mind talking to the Professor? If there are people that have activated their mutant gene improperly, they may need help. And you may be able to help us find them," Aegis said earnestly.

Spidey hesitated. Finally, it came down to the fact that they were doing this just to rescue innocents. "Sure. Do you have a business card?" he quipped.

Storm chuckled as she reached into her belt and pulled out a single card. "In fact, I do."

"Auntie-O, I can't believe you sometimes." Spyke just slapped his head.

Several buildings away and upwind, a figure glared as one of his plans fell apart from the shadows of a rooftop. The white haired man frowned as he realized that he would have to divert funds to a different scientist. Zabu would not be able to help with his own. He clenched his hand and with a massive effort of will, caused a very powerful and localized electromagnetic pulse to fry all of the computers within the building.

* * *

**Chapter 7: Beasts of War**

Julie Carpenter frowned as she saw Jean Gray down the hallway, talking to that jock Duncan. He was a royal jerk and she had no idea what the other red-head saw in him. But she owed the X-Men an apology. "Hey, Gray."

"I'll see you around, Duncan?" Jean said quickly to her boyfriend.

"Sure, babe," the blond jock said with a cocky grin. "Gotta head to gym anyways." He walked down the hall, meeting up with some of his friends from the football team.

"Hello, Julie," the telekinetic then said, turning to the female member of the brotherhood.

"You guys did what you said you would. I have to admit, I thought you were just pacifist idiots," Julie said as she controlled her anger.

"That's not what the X-Men are about. We are trying to bridge the gulf between human, mutant and even others." Jean's green eyes studied the other girl.

"I got that. I still think you guys are way to idealistic, but maybe we need someone like that around. Even if it isn't me. So while we aren't friends, I don't think we are enemies either. I'll see you around, Red," Julie said with a grin.

"See you around, 'Red'," Jean replied with her own grin.

* * *

"Yo! Sheila!" Todd called out. He was hopping across the quad to her just after the bell rang.

"Hey Todd. What are you up to?" she asked.

"Just hanging. I saw Julie watching the news about that Brand Corporation bust. She seemed really pissed at them over the genetic experiments and stuff," the hunchbacked mutant said. "That was you guys, right?"

"The X-Men crashed that party and then called the police and FBI," she admitted.

"You don't think humans and mutants can live together, do you?" the reviled, deformed mutant asked.

"Why not? We are supposed to be living in a modern, more enlightened age. "

"People don't like things that are different," Toad remarked as he shook his head. "And I speak from experience on that." He started to hop away, even as he was zipped by Evan Daniels on his skateboard with a swing sound of the wheels.

"Hey Todd! It's all about being eclectic and knowing how to market yourself," she called out to him. At his confused look, she rephrased it. "Making it look like you are just quirky and being cool about it."

"Yeah, right!" He continued to hop off.

The blonde girl frowned at that. That was an angry young man that was not seeing any escape. She shook her head, looking around and realized that Scott's car and the X-Van were not in the parking lot. "I guess they took me at my word about not waiting for me." With a shrug, she started to jog down the street. Once she was out of sight from the school and friends, she would...

...spot a certain misanthropic mutant that wanted Wolverine's head on a platter. Oh, great. Time to lose him, then.

Half an hour later, she realized that she was going to have just as much luck losing Sabertooth as she was Wolverine. Basically close to none. Their noses were still quite a bit more sensitive than her own super-human sniffer. And he could probably follow her trail if she runs fast, it just might take him a while. She cornered and slipped her hand into her pocket and had her cell phone out, sending a message to Kitty with one hand in less than ten seconds.

She continued to try and evade things for ten more minutes, goading him into making a mistake near the edge of a small copse of trees and abandoned buildings. Sheila almost ducked fast enough to avoid a swipe of Sabertooth's claws. Her favorite shirt got five rips up the back.

"You know, if that could have hurt me, I would be a lot more upset," she noted as dodged backwards and then kicked him hard in the face.

Sabertooth looked at his claws to verify that he really had failed to cut her. "Huh, I guess it makes sense why you didn't run right to the runt when you spotted me. I thought I remembered you being invulnerable." So with that, he then went and charged at her. It took five separate attacks, but he finally kicked her right through a tree. "How's that working out, kid?"

"Perfectly fine, duh. You know, having super-strength should be really cool, but you outclass me in that department," she complained as she kicked him in the head.

"Which means I can probably capture you, even if I can't hurt you. Man, I'll bet that will chap your hide, being a damsel in distress," Sabertooth said as he switched to trying to catch the lithe girl.

"And it's quite interesting how your healing factor works," Sheila noted as she leaped off a tree. "Have any problems remembering anything due your healing factor regenerating new brain cells?"

"My memory is fine, unlike the runt's. Beneficial mutation, brat," Sabertooth snarled out. "Besides, I _know_ why his brains all messed up."

"Did you hear that, Wolverine?" Sheila asked.

"I did, kid. Appreciate you letting me know he was here and keeping him distracted long enough to catch up," the berserker yelled out as he tackled Sabertooth to the ground. "So, let's talk about my memories, Sabertooth."

"Dr. Cornelius would be annoyed if I did, after all the work he did on your brain." Sabertooth casually remarked. "Hell, I'd be surprised if you even remembered Captain America." He booted his pint-sized foe off of him and into a wall.

Wolverine hacked at Sabertooth. "Cap, I remember. It's after that things turn into a blur."

"At least you don't remember that lunatic Wade." The huge mutant lunged forward, his clawed hands stabbing into the ground with deadly force as he just missed the smaller mutant.

Sheila slipped away to where several X-Men were watching the fight. "Just in case?"

Storm nodded. "Exactly."

"You wouldn't believe how hard it was to like convince him," Shadowcat said, looking very cutely frustrated.

"Ja! He vwas all 'It's my fight, don't butt in,' and everything," Nightcrawler said from where he was hanging from a branch.

Rogue and Jean were both studying the fight with an analytical eye.

"Ahm impressed with how he can fight someone that is bigger and stronger than him," the skunk-striped girl noted. "And it doesn't _look_ that skilled either."

Sabertooth snarled in anger. "They got your back? Well, now that I know you are in the area, I'll look you up later. Runt." He bounded off into the woods with surprising speed for a huge guy.

"Looks like we'll have to upgrade our defenses to deal with someone that can take lethal force defenses and get back up," Sheila mused as she watched Creed leave. "I bet his healing factor deals with most drugs, too."

"Shouldn't we go after him?" Cyclops asked.

"Kid he's way out of your league," Wolverine remarked a touch harsher then usual.

Sheila was so very tempted to make a comment about all the machismo being displayed. If Sabertooth were a danger and a threat, it really should have been something the team _dealt_ with. Putting him in some prison somewhere had to be better than just doing these random fights.

Everyone piled into the X-Van except Wolverine, who got on his motorcycle and drove off in seeming anger. Storm narrowed her eyes as she saw a figure walking up to the gate of the school as they approached. She pulled up next to and rolled down the window just enough to show her face (but not her X-Men uniform.)

"Oh, um, Storm right?" the brown-haired boy said in greeting. "You guys had mentioned that you might be able to tell me more about mutants and mutates."

"I'm sorry, I don't recall meeting you. Perhaps you could jog my memory?" the teacher asked.

"Oh, ah, I'm not used to meeting people afterwards. On a brighter note, I guess the mask really works," Peter Parker said in a half-nervous voice.

Sheila sniffed from the back seat at the cracked window. "From that lab at Brand Corporation, right?" she asked casually.

"Right, right. Um, can I come in?" the teen asked.

"Sure," Scott said across the front seat. He looked in the back at Jean, Kurt, Kitty and Sheila with Evan in the back trunk area. "Um, we're kinda full." Evan waved from the very back.

Kitty and Sheila slid out of the X-Van. "We'll walk with him," Kitty said. "I'm Kitty and this is Sheila."

"Hi. I'm Peter. You look like you've been running around," he said nervously to the blonde.

"I've been being hunted for about an hour or two," Sheila said with a shrug. "So what were you doing there?"

"Well, I was trying to decide if I should enter or not. I scoped out the place and found out you have _much _better security than I've ever seen. I was actually about to go and get into costume to try and sneak in," he said with a nervous twitter.

"Why?" Kitty asked the (in her mind) cute boy.

"Um, well, I wear a mask to protect my family. But it seemed a bit stupid to come to this school in costume. Especially when I heard from some of the kids around here how this is a school for the gifted." He seemed quite conflicted.

They trooped up the main front steps and into the large foyer of the academy.

"Welcome to Xavier's Institute of Higher Learning for the Gifted," Kitty said with a wide smile.

"And I am Professor Xavier. Welcome. Sabertooth didn't hurt you, did he, Sheila?" the professor asked as his wheelchair rolled up from the right wing.

"No, though he might kidnap one of us to try and get Wolverine to a trap," she said brightly.

"Uh, hi. I'm Peter. I guess I'm what you would call a mutate?" the nervous teen asked.

"Yes, a latent mutant that has been activated and changed due to the environment in unforeseen ways. I've been wanting to get some long term information for a medical study. I'm a professor of genetics, specializing in mutations."

"I read some of your work with Erik Lenhsherr on the subject, " Peter mused aloud. "I wonder if we could contact him for assistance?"

"I'm afraid I've lost contact with him after a small falling out," Professor X replied blandly.

The blonde demigoddess frowned for a second, as her overly acute hearing had picked up a catch in the professor's voice. She raised an eyebrow at him at the lie.

_'I think it would be best not to go into that matter in depth,'_ the professor telepathed to her. "So you read _The Paradigm of Genetics_? I have to say, that its a bit outdated but mostly beyond a student in high school."

"Oh, ah, well I was trying to figure out what was going on with me and it was the only thing at the public library that even seemed to remotely match. I'm glad I'm taking AP Biology, otherwise I would have been totally lost," Peter explained.

"Yes, I can see that. Well, why don't we go down to the medical bay and take a few samples and run a few tests," the professor said as they started to move towards the elevator. "I'd like to make sure your genetic structure is stable. I'd rather not find out that you will keep mutating."

"Oh, wow. My aunt would totally freak if I suddenly grew four extra arms like a real arachnid," the mutate said in sudden worry.

"I doubt that will happen, but I'd like to make sure. I've been researching a bit about a syndrome I've named after one mutant that suffered a very extreme and deadly secondary mutation. Secondary Mutation Syndrome can be a life threatening situation."

Sheila frowned at that, actually picking up a very hidden hint of sadness from the professor. "So this could be a natural extension of your mutation that might cause a detriment to your health?" She started to very closely examine everyone who was following along. "You might be right to worry, professor. I do think Peter here might have a mutation fluctuation problem. Evans might also have a small instability in his structure."

The professor's wheelchair stopped as he looked at her. "You can detect that?" he said in shock.

"Now that I know what to look for, yes. It's not life threatening, but they both have some instability already," she replied.

"Um, wow. If that's the case, I'm really happy that I came here," Peter said as he gulped.

"Auntie-O?" Evans asked Ororo in a worried voice.

"Let's go get you tested before we start worrying. This could be why you have some control issues, as your mutation may not be as stable as we thought," the older woman said. She put her hand on her nephew's shoulder. "I'll need to let my sister know too."

"I know, I know," the skater-dude said in long suffering.

The rest of the evening was set taking samples. Peter had to leave by about six, but he had been fascinated by Professor Xavier's and Sheila's conversation about genetics and what sort of things could be done to stabilize the two mutations.

Sheila could probably cure it mystically, but that wouldn't help anyone if she wasn't always around.


	3. Competitions

**Chapter 8: Survival of the Fittest**

"Survival camp today, right?" Sheila asked Rogue as they sat down for breakfast two weeks later.

"That's rahght," the other girl replied. "Ah'm hoping to work on my tan."

"Take that a little slowly, as your skin is still sun-sensitive. I'd use a nice sun block. You don't look thrilled, Kitty," the demigoddess noted even as she scooped up some poached eggs onto her plate along with a few breakfast sausages.

"I'm like totally not looking forward to this," the Chicago valley-girl said in a whiny voice. "Lance was talking about it yesterday at school and thinks it is dumb too."

"Ja? I don't see what you see in dat guy," Kurt said from his seat across the table. He had his hologram disguise on already.

"Yeah, he's always hanging around Pietro, Todd and Fred," Evans said a bit angrily.

"You know, Todd isn't that bad. He's got the raw end of the deal with his mutations. I mean all of us are lucky to not have any physical deformities," Scott said slowly. "How would you like that your mutation made you fat, green or smelled bad?"

"Scott is right. That makes them stand out more and harder for them to fit in. Scott, don't forget that you have your appointment with the neurologist on Friday. He's a trusted friend and might have some insights on how to treat your old head injury," Professor X said from the end of the table.

"Yes, sir. I hope he can help, as I'd really like to see something other than red," the young man replied.

* * *

Everyone trooped off the yellow bus, wary and sometimes angry glances between the Brotherhood and the X-Men. It was a beautiful fall afternoon with almost perfect sunshine, green grass and trees everywhere around the survival camp in the woods.

"I'm not really a nature nut, but this looks delightful," Sheila said to the rest of them all.

"So people that like outdoors are nature nuts, are they?" Julie said even as she pulled her red hair back into a tight ponytail.

"Nutty can be good, ja? Granola!" Kurt said with a laugh, confusing the spider-themed mutate.

"I bet they don't even have Internet out here," Kitty groused.

"What? A little afraid of not being able to check your email, yo?" Todd asked, his messy brown hair waving in the slight wind where he crouched on the ground.

"I am not afraid!" she snapped back.

"Hey, we can't let the non-mutants find out about our powers," Jean said worried Lance started to shake the ground.

"That's no fun," Fred Dukes said with a nasty grin.

"Sounds like you feel you can't do anything without your powers," Jean countered a bit angrily.

"Ha! We'll show you," Lance called out. "No powers for the entire time, right?"

"You got it, Lance," Scott answered immediately.

That was when the camp director stomped up to their bus. "All right you lily-livered wimps. You have been signed up for this survival course because you don't know which end of a shovel to use to dig a latrine. Well, boys and girls, by the time I am done with you, you will be able to do that and many other simple, basic things that your tiny brains can comprehend." His sunglasses were darker for being shaded under the wide brim of his hat, looking _everything_ like a retired marine. Which of course he was.

All of the mutants (and their one mutate and demigoddess) groaned at that. It was a grueling morning as Scott and Lance sniped at each other constantly over 'leadership', even with the placating intervention of Sheila, Kitty, Todd and (surprisingly) Julie.

"This is so unfair," Regan Wyngrade complained. "I don't have any physical abilities like _some_ people." She still had quite a hatred for the physically invulnerable blonde.

"It's not like I can turn them off. Do you realize how boring it is holding back constantly?" she countered.

"Yeah, the whole world makes me wait for it. And people wonder why I'm so impatient," Pietro whined petulantly. "I could have been there and back across the water, even without a canoe." He splashed the water as if it were its fault.

"I figured out if you run faster than a hundred miles an hour that water is pretty solid," Sheila admitted as the canoed along. "Rogue, you _can_ turn off the physical abilities."

"Rahght, rahght," the skunk-striped mutant grumbled. She was in the back of her canoe and had been putting quite a bit of effort into paddling.

It was only fifteen minutes later (after they grounded) that she realized she was starting to sunburn pretty bad. It was fairly hard for her to put on sun block lotion everywhere, but she was enjoying the first tanning attempt.

"All right, grubs and worms," the old retired military officer shouted out. He figured a good drag-out competition between these two groups was just thing to get them tired enough to not cause any more issues. "We're going to have a little competition where you climb that mountain and plant a flag. The first team up there _doesn't_ have to do latrine duty tonight. And just to make it interesting and to show team spirit, I want picture proof that everyone made it." He had two old Kodak instant cameras for them.

"We are so winning that, four-eyes!" Lance shouted out even as Julie and Regan whooped it up behind him.

"You wish, you thug," Scott snapped right back with unaccustomed anger.

"You aren't doing anything to Scott, are you Regan?" Sheila asked suspiciously as she glared at the enemy mentat.

"Nope, all that _delicious_ anger is all his own," the blonde illusionist said in a bored tone.

The two teams started climbing up separate paths up the rugged, but picturesque mountain. As far as mountains are, it was not really that rugged our tough. The X-Men started up the path of least resistance, making good time. Scott was in the lead with Evans.

"Come on, Scott. Wve can use out powers now and zhow up those jherks," the teleporter of their group called out. "I can get us up to de top in no time."

"I thought it was supposed to be no powers?" Jean called out from her place third on the rope.

Scott bit his lower lip. "She's right, we made a promise. We can beat them without our powers." He had been so tempted for a moment, but he cared more about Jean opinion and had seen her disappointment in his obvious expression.

They were closing on the top when they heard some shouting from a mine shaft.

"Hey! Help!" Todd shouted out. "We're trapped!"

The Brotherhood had decided to try and cheat while going through the mine and got themselves perilously trapped thanks to Avalanche's powers.

"Kitty, I want you to phase Kurt and you down there. Get any injured people out immediate. Jean, Sheila and Rogue; muscle those boulders out of the way. Evan, make some bone prybars to help them," Scott called out, snapping orders like he was born for it.

The X-Men jumped into action. Kurt phased Kitty all the way down to where Fred and Julie were holding up a cave in. Psychic webs were straining under weight.

"Who's hurt?" Kitty called out as they stepped through the wall.

"Regan and Pietro took some lumps and are out. But what about the rest of us?" Lance shouted out worriedly. He had never felt so useless in his life.

With a poof, the teleporting-mutant disappeared with both of those.

"Don't worry, we've trained for this sort of thing," the young X-Men said to her some-time friend. She reached up and touched a boulder and phased it through the webbing and into the ground with a deft twist so she wasn't affected or in danger.

"That's a neat trick," Julie admitted with wide eyes.

It was only five more minutes and working together, everyone was soon at the top, only three hundred feet from the top.

Lance and Scott were butting heads again.

"We aren't going to let you win, Summers," the earthquake-producing mutant said. "If I have to, I'll shake this mountain down upon your head!"

"And we won't stand for you trying to bully us," the red-glasses wearing young man shouted right back.

"This is supposed to be a friendly competition," Sheila groused as she finished healing Regan.

"Ah know. So much for good sportsmanship," Rogue said as she tried to heal up Pietro, but it was being hard for her.

"Hey, Lance! Cut it out-!" Regan called out from where she was sitting next to the mine entrance.

Overhead, the Blackbird hovered on its VTOL thrusters.

"X-Men, we have a situation at the mansion." Storm narrowed her eyes. "Brotherhood, Mystique is also in danger from a mutant known as the Juggernaut. Would you like a lift?"

The X-Men and Brotherhood shared a quick nod. In moments, they had taken a joint picture of them both having made it to the top of the mountain with a quick burst of their powers to get there.

* * *

"Nothing can stop the Juggernaut," the huge, red and maroon armored-wearing mutant said as he smashed through the gate of Xavier's. "I'm coming for you, Charles! And I'm not going to be stopped. Especially not in what should be my home!"

Mystique was severely frustrated by the imbecile. Instead of working with her against Xavier, Cain Marko tossed her aside to go after his half brother.

'I need Cerebro intact, and he's destroying everything,' Raven thought bitterly as she followed him into the grounds. First the Brotherhood and now this. Good help was extremely hard to find, though perhaps she could still steal Cerebro in the confusion.

Wolverine snarled as he leaped on the Juggernaut's back again, slicing furiously even as the mansion's defenses blasted at him from several energy cannons that popped up from the grounds. It might as well have been squirtguns for all the good it did. "Grahhhh!"

Juggernaut just reached up and grabbed the feral mutant and tossed him through wall and into the house. With booming footsteps, he lowered his head and smashed the dome-like helmet he wore through another wall. "Charles! I'm home!"

"Cain, this has gone far enough," Xavier tried to reason, even as his wheel chair took him down the hallway backwards.

Wolverine again leaped on Juggernaut's face, trying to slice him with his admantium claws. "You aren't getting past me, bub," he called out.

Huge, meaty hands grabbed his head and tried to crush his unbreakable skull. When that didn't work, he tossed the smaller mutant through a wall that happened to hide the Cerebro device. "If you won't stay down, I'll smash you flat so you can't walk!" He stomped over to the shattered console and punched Wolverine right through the wall and the device.

"Cain! You are here for me, not Wolverine," Professor X called out from down the hallway. As Juggernaut approached him, he hit the elevator button, going down even as Mystique snarled at his side.

"How is this going to help?" the shapeshifter asked him.

"We are merely delaying him," was the quick reply.

In moments, Xavier was making his last stand in the Danger Room, releasing the training machine's built in safety limits. Juggernaut was over halfway to him when three blurs appeared.

"This is the guy causing a problem?" Quicksilver called out as he hammered hundreds of punched all around the giant mutant attacker. "He's so slow he's no threat to me."

Aegis and Rogue were not nearly as fast, but had some super-strength. They both hit the Juggernaut's jaw with brick-shattering force, barely moving his head backwards in surprise.

"That tickled," he said with a chuckle.

"Well, he has no glass jaw," the demigoddess noted as she danced backwards.

With a Bamf of displaced brimstone-smoke, Nightcrawler appeared with the Blob and Cyclops. "He's huge!" the German mutant exclaimed in surprised.

The Blob just smirked as he charged in, leading with his belly. "I'm bigger," he shouted, before he actually bounced off the Juggernaut.

"What? More of your students, Charles?" Juggernaut then unleashed a punch that actually staggered the massively fat mutant.

A bolt of crimson lightning hit him then with the force of a cannon. Cyclops looked shocked, as the Juggernaut was not even slightly affected. He sent a second blast to the same effect even as Spyke added his own bone-spears to the attack.

"No way!" the skater shouted as they bounced to no affect.

Juggernaut was tromping through that blast when webs appeared, slowing him down slightly. Arachne grunted from the exertion. "How is that possible?" she asked.

"Nothing stops the Juggernaut! Don't you know that?" the giant mutant shouted.

"I can't affect him at all?" Lady Mastermind called out in shock.

"His helmet blocks all telepathic attacks, his only weakness! X-Men, Brotherhood! There are four latches. Release them and remove that helmet!" Xavier called out from only fifty feet away.

Nightcrawler appeared on the Juggernaut's head, flipping one of the four latches, teleporting away when Juggernaut tried to punch him. "Wvone!"

"Two, ayup!" the Toad shouted as he bounced off two walls and the ceiling then clicked a second latch on the helmet.

"Watch out," Shadowcat called out, phasing through the Juggernaut, grabbing the leaping Brotherhood member and then phasing them through a wall.

Storm unleashed a lightning bolt which caused the unstoppable mutate to just laugh. "You will be stopped here," the weather-controlling mutant called out.

"Let's do it, Rogue! I'll distract him since you aren't invulnerable," the blonde demigoddess said quietly to her room-mate as a quick plan.

"Rahght!" she replied.

They both charged in again, ducking huge, ham-fisted punches. Aegis moved just a bit faster, unlatching the third helmet catch. "Hya!" she shouted out. She braced herself so she wouldn't go flying and set herself to accept his punch. Blinding pain erupted from her shoulder as it dislocated. "Eaugh." His other arm's right hook smashed into her face, rocketing her away in a spray of blood.

"Sheila!" Rogue shouted. Her eyes glowed red for just a second before she unleashed Cyclop's blasts.

Cyclops joined in, forcing Juggernaut to push through both beams.

"Now!" Wolverine shouted as the two stopped blasting while leaping from above. One claw swiped at Juggernaut's face while the second hit the last latch.

Juggernaut's helmet rolled across the ground like an oversized bowl. "No!" he shouted in fear, even as Professor X and Lady Mastermind attacked psychically.

A massive, clawed version of Professor X appeared as a horrible vision, slashing at him just before the real Professor X blasted him with enough mental force knock him out.

"How can Sheila even be hurt? She's invulnerable!" Shadowcat called out as she ran over to the prone form.

"Brotherhood, it's time to leave," Mystique ordered.

"Shouldn't we finish her off," Lady Mastermind asked in a low voice after she had walked over.

The blue-skinned mutant's frown was thunderous. "The damage is already done. Now that Rogue has her powers so far under control, there's nothing we can do."

The rest of the Brotherhood shared serious looked as they filed that information away. Mystique really had only been attacking Aegis because of Rogue.

Toad stopped for a second. "Hey, guys, I'll catch up, yo." He hopped off towards the circle of X-Men.

"Ah can't heal her? Why ain't it- Of course," Rogue was saying where she was kneeling next to the mangled form of Sheila.

Jean was shaking her head. "I don't dare move her until we know her back isn't hurt. I'm holding her back and neck stable with my telekinesis just to be on the safe side."

Rogue leaned over the bloodied and battered face. "Her Relic." She unzipped Aegis's sky-blue and black X-Man uniform a little bit at the neck and then put her finger on the amulet. The amulet recognized her mistresses Legend and Sheila's shattered face suddenly healed until it was just black and blue, with two heavily bruised eyes.

"Whoa," the Toad said in shock. Relic? Why would Sheila's amulet make a difference? And why that term?

"She'll be fine now. Just battered and bruised," Rogue said in relief as her eyes saw that the demigoddess was out of danger. "How could Juggernaut have been able to hurt her?"

Professor X studied the fallen student, then looked over to the Toad. "My brother found a mystical artifact that imbued his latent mutant genes with power, the Gem of Cyttorak. It is possible the magical, legendary power allowed him to hurt her."

The rest of the X-Men shared worried looks even as Rogue leaned down to touch Aegis with her bare hand. It was only for a long moment for her to copy the powers and memories before she released it. "Cyttorak being more Legendary than her... that makes sense."

"She's going to be all right, right?" the hunchbacked mutant asked. "She and Scott have been the only people to stick up for me like ever."

"It appears she will be fine. You could stop by in a few days to see how she is. How is that?" Xavier told the young man.

"Yo, that's great!" With that, he turned and hopped away with a smile on his face.

Arachne looked over at him. "So she's going to be okay?"

"Yup! Rogue figured out a way to heal her. Not that I understood it," he pointed out quickly.

* * *

It was the next day that Sheila showed up to school at Bayville High, with only a few bruises on her face.

"What the hell? You were nearly dead!" Regan nearly shouted as she looked up from her locker. She finished grabbing her math and science books.

Julie turned around, her mouth agape. "Well, you've looked better," she finally said with a bit of humor.

"It's nice to know you guys care," she replied with a wan grin. "I should be all better soon."

"You should get to class," Scott said a bit worriedly. "I can't believe the professor let you come to school." He had reverted to a very worrying hen after she had been hurt so severely, the lingering guilt from when he had hurt her accidentally so long ago.

"Scott, she's not made of glass," Rogue complained as she put her gloved hands on her hips. "And really, she's almost rahght as rain."

"Come on, Scott, we need to get to class," Jean said, dragging him off down the hallway. "Oh, Duncan!"

"So did your powers go on the futz?" the Brotherhood's red-head asked curiously.

"Actually, no. It appears Juggernaut's powers are uniquely suited for bypassing my invulnerability." Sheila gave them a shrug. "I'm not going to give an in-depth explanation."

"Drats, foiled again," the blonde illusionist said with a mock put-upon look on her face.

The red-head ducked her head, hiding her eyes behind her bangs. "Say, Sheila, I hear you are a whiz at tutoring people at math. Do you think you could help me with a makeup test? It wasn't something that I'd studied at my last school," Julie said slowly.

"Sure. Here at school, the mansion, or over at the boarding house?" she asked instantly.

Julie tried to judge the trust being involved. "How about at the mansion? I'll just ring at the gate."

"Sure." Sheila turned and walked to her own locker, waving to a few students. Loaded down with her books, she started walking to first class when she felt the first inkling of a supernatural presence. A moment of meditation had her open her inner eye upon her brow. _'Doctor Strange? Is there an emergency?'_

_'Yes, indeed. I will be away from the mortal plane of existence on a mission, so will not be able to continue our lessons this Saturday. I should be back shortly afterwards.' _ With that, the astral form of the Sorcerer Supreme flashed off back to his body.

* * *

**Chapter 9: Shadows of the Past, Rays of the Future**

It was a week later that Rogue awoke with a start, bouncing out of the bed with a thump to tangle herself up in her blankets.

Sheila looked up from her bed as she sat up, sleepily rubbing her eyes. "Nightmare?"

"Yeah, ah was fleeing from a castle from a man named Magneto." Rogue unconsciously duplicated the young demigoddess's mental powers, the memories suddenly coming into perfect clarity. A feeling of deja vu descended on her even as she sat on her bed in the lotus meditation manner, elbows on her knees and hands outstretched.

About ten minutes later, she had reviewed Mystique's memories of a long ago day when she lost her son and left him for normal humans to raise. A certain blue-furred baby with yellow eyes, with two fingers and a thumb. "Well ah'll be a monkey's uncle."

"Rogue... trying to... sleep here..." her roommate responded muzzily from her bed.

"I just discovered Kurt is my stepbrother."

"You are kidding, right?" Sheila sat up, rubbing her eyes.

"No, but not sure how to break it to Kurt that Mystique is his mother," Rogue admitted. "I think Magneto was doing an experiment on him and she objected."

"The more I hear about this Magneto, the less I like. We better go get Kurt and the professor." With a groan, she pulled herself out of her bed.

Rogue went and found Kurt, knocking loudly on his door. "Heya, Elf. Ah got something important to tell you and the professor."

"Can't it wait till morning?" he asked piteously.

"It's rather important and about your biological family."

That got Nightcrawler's interest. "But how?" he asked sounding confused.

"It's complicated and Ah don't want to explain it twice." Rogue led him to where Sheila and the professor were waiting in his office. The professor was in pajamas and had a bathrobe on.

"I'm to understand that you remembered some important information concerning Kurt," Xavier said as he studied them all closely.

"Ah do." Rogue seemed torn, almost the goth-like waif she was when she arrived at the mansion. "Kurt, ah found out who your mother is."

"Vwhat? How iz that possible?" the blue-skinned mutant exclaimed in shock.

"She got it from her memories and my perfect recall. That allowed her to remember something from your mother's far past," Sheila said, looking much more awake.

"I'm szoo confused," the teleporter said.

"Your mother is Raven Darkholme," Rogue finally said.

Kurt's yellow eyes stared at her in shock. "So my appearance is like hers because of her mutation?"

"I suspected the possibility, but with the wildly different mutations that can happen, there was no way to confirm," Xavier said after a moment of consideration. "Interesting then. You are a second generation mutant, like Pietro Maximoff."

"Rogue mentioned that Mystique had a falling out with Magneto. You said something about he was experimenting on Kurt?"

That got a gasps out of Kurt and the professor.

"Ah remember a castle in Europe, abandoned and rebuilt. Raven- Mystique fled from Magneto and his wolves that he used as his guards, but lost you while trying to escape down a river. That's when your adoptive parents found you." Rogue was struggling with the strength of the memories, tears started to leak out of her eyes. "Ah know how wretched she is, but... no mother should lose her child."

"Rogue, you need to meditate for a few hours," Sheila said worriedly. "Mystiques memories are starting to overtake you. Though knowing your foes are so very human reminds us that they are people, not just targets."

"Yes, indeed." Xavier was thinking very succinctly. "I think I'm going to send Wolverine to reconnaissance the base. It is possible that Magneto is still using it for further experiments on mutation."

A small fact suddenly clicked into place. "Magneto can wipe out computer systems, can't he? He was behind Brand Corp and Arachne."

Xavier nodded slowly. "We are slowly gaining important information about his activities. But with his powers lending to erasing his tracks, it has been difficult."

* * *

"I don't need any baby sitters," Logan snapped again as he walked to the Blackbird.

"We are _backup_. And Kurt deserves to know what is there anyways. What if Magneto collapses the building on you?" Aegis countered.

"Ah agree and the professor did too," the skunk-haired mutant pointed out.

"Ja! We are a team!"

With that, they were soon rocketing across the world as Rogue was being put through an impromptu training class. She was a bit more steady than Kurt had been earlier and found it to be fairly easily. She frowned as she realized she was drawing on some of Sheila's memories from when she had read the piloting manual and from repairing the Blackbird.

Wolverine put the Blackbird down at the location Rogue had given them earlier. The castle was at the top of a craggy hill, dark and forbidding among leafless and fairly evil looking trees.

"There better not be any hags here," Aegis said warily as she checked out the area. "There's a reason no one comes here to this section of the Black Woods."

"No snow now," the power-absorbing mutant said as she struggled with the borrowed memories.

"We need to sneak up there," the leader of the group said.

"I see an area that doesn't seem to be covered in sensors. Nightcrawler, do you see that large craggy outcropping? We need to appear in the shadows behind it," the young demigoddess asked.

"Ja! Hang on!"

With the customary BAMF, they appeared right next to the rocks. Aegis was already studying the castle with their new vantage spot.

"That tower was where Magneto was conducting his experiments." Rogue was pointing to a tower and in fact the window from her memories.

"Elf, get us in there," Wolverine called out.

They appeared just inside the high, open window to land easily on the ground.

"Vaas? It's all destroyed!" Nightcrawler's eyes were looking around at all the smashed electronics and chemical equipment.

"Bombs on five minute timers!" Aegis shouted out as she pointed at the nearest one. The eighteen inch wide disk on the wall had a large counter on it.

"We have ta defuse them if we are going to learn anything," the skunk-haired mutant called out.

"Go!" Wolverine called out, even as Nightcrawler double teleported, leaving the bomb to fall into the nearby lake.

Wolverine, Aegis and Rogue were dashing through the castle, looking for more bombs while disabling the security. Nighcrawler joined them in their frantic haste and in only five minutes, they managed to get all but two bombs. The last one exploded in the blonde demigoddess' face while the last one shredded their leader up.

Miles away, Magneto frowned as he realized his hasty demolition plans had been thwarted. So he would have to take active action to stop them from figuring out his research. With but a twist of his mind, he floated into the air and towards his laboratory even as he started to go over the plans to further strengthen his desert base.

"Magneto!" Aegis suddenly called out as she detected a powerful magnetic field as her preparedness paid off. "He's approaching rapidly!"

And with a boom, he arrived as he smashed open a wall by ripping out some of the electronic laboratory equipment. "I'm afraid that I can't let you investigate this place any further. Xavier would figure out too much," the Master of Magnetism called out in a powerful voice.

Wolverine leaped forward with a snarl, only to be caught by the metal in his bones by a powerful magnetic field. Unnoticed, the electro-magnetic fields reduced a small receiver in his skull to super-heated fragments for just a second, knocking him out.

"So easy," the mutant in red and purple said with a sneer. "Let us test your invulnerability against my overwhelming power." With that, he flung Wolverine at Aegis so fast that a sonic boom was created.

The young demigoddess almost dodged it, but the two of them both shot out of the castle through its very hard and strong wall. Rogue stepped up and with a classic Cyclops pose, blasted at Magneto with the impact eye-beams which were blocked by metal scrap. "Nightcrawler, ah think we better retreat."

"Ja!"

That was when Aegis flew back into the castle through the window and tried to punch Magneto, only to be blocked by more debris that was magnetically moved to block her.

"I thought you were supposed to be the smart one. While I _might_ not be able to directly hurt you, child, I can certainly capture you and your friends if you don't leave." With that he held up his arms and started to shake apart the castle.

"Aegis, he's right. We should retreat," the Rogue called out.

"Double ja! Like post haste!" Nighcrawler shouted out.

The demigoddess flew over to Rogue and Nightcrawler and in a poof of black, sulphurous smoke, appeared back in the Blackbird.

"Well, that was humbling," the blond X-Men said as she moved over to check on Wolverine who was laid out on the floor regenerating.

"Ah wish we knew what he was doing here," the skunk-haired girl said angrily.

"And what he vas doing with me. I mean, I get my looks from Mystique, I guess. Did he give me teleporting powers? Or the wall-climbing?" the blue-skinned mutant asked with a frown on his youthful face.

"I doubt he was using the lab for the same purpose _exactly_ as he was fifteen years ago," Aegis said as she started to pre-flight the jet. "Did you see it, Rogue? I think his genetic structure is weakening."

"Eh?" Nightcrawler blurted out.

"Maybe?" Rogue would hate to admit it, but she hadn't looked.

"I think we had better mention that to the professor," Aegis said.

"Ja. We came for ansvers and just have more questions."


	4. The Cauldron of Hate

**Chapter 10: Cauldron of Hate**

Scott sighed as he exited the _passenger_ side of his car. "I wish Dr. Calgary would quit asking about what type of eye disease I have that keeps him from checking my eyes." He was a little wobbly after the chemicals they had him intake for his varied scans. MRI, CAT Scans and old fashioned X-Rays. Actually, the second time as they wanted to make sure the location was not operable.

His best friend just shook her head, sending her red hair cascading across her shoulders. "I know what you mean. But at least he's confirmed the damage." Jean gave him a smile.

"Again... I wonder if the professor has any ideas?" he asked.

"Oh, I'm sure I have some ideas. And Sheila and Kitty have both suggested something rather amazing," the professor in his wheelchair said as he came around the corner from the garage on the sidewalk. "Come along then."

In just moments they were in the medical section of the mansion, in the basement. Scott blinked behind his ruby quartz glasses. "What are you two up to?" he asked the two girls ahead of him.

"Kitty has figured out how phase through objects to selectively take other objects out. Which helps for infiltration missions by allowing her to pick pockets through cloth. But we are trying to get her to get to the point of removing a small fragment in this gelatin," Sheila explained as she waved over to Kitty who was carefully phasing her fingers through a head made of reddish goo.

"This is harder than it looks," the Chicago valley-girl complained.

Sheila leaned closer. "I think you've almost got it."

Scott and Jean watched as Kitty (tongue sticking out slightly out she concentrated) extracted a nearly perfect replica of the small shard of bone. "Got it!"

"Very good Kitty. And only with a day of practice," Xavier said with a smile to congratulate her success.

"But Kitty won't be able to see the fragment in Scott's head like that," the younger, red-headed telepath noted in worry.

"Ah, but that's where I and Professor X come in. I can do a pretty good impression of picking up X-Rays and let Kitty see through my eyes with the Professor's telepathy. I've been practicing on expanding my senses," the young demigoddess explained.

"That can work. Can we do it right now?" the young male asked them. "I'd really want to be able to control my mutation finally." And finally see into Jean's eyes without red lenses in the way.

"They feel pretty confident. Kitty? Sheila?" Xavier called out to them as Scott laid down on the table.

"Try to breath in and out like you are meditating, Mr. Summers," Sheila ordered with a grin on her face.

He closed his eyes even as he did as ordered. The mutant-phasing girl stood next to him even as Sheila stepped into her space and burned power into her eyes. The small fragment of bone became visible. The barest touches of Professor X's telepathy linked the two together.

"Whoa, freaking vision. Now don't move, Scott," Kitty called out softly. "You shouldn't feel a thing." Her fingers pushed through his head with no resistance. Very carefully she extended her phasing power to touch the small shard of bone and then pinched it and then pulled it out. She then set it down in the petri dish with her practice pieces. "Tada! We rock!"

Suddenly, she could see the 'wound' in Scott's head in metaphysical terms, even as it healed up.

"There's still some damage, but it might be better," Sheila said in frustration. Her dominion over healing wasn't enough to regenerate the damage fully. Plus the human brain was not as easy to fix as an arm or leg would be.

Scott still felt a pressure in his eyes, but for the first time felt the ability to pull back on the energies slightly. Straining mightily, he pulled back on them while pulling off his shades and then carefully peaking out one eye. "I-I-I can see." Everything was so vivid, so colorful.

"Oh, Scott! That's wonderful!" his oldest and dearest friend said with the only red he wanted to see in her hair.

"Guahu-" the teen mutant said as a spike of pain erupted in his head and power started to leak out of his eyes. He clasped his hands over his closed eyes.

"You aren't fully healed, but it looks like you might be able to control your optic blasts if someone knocks your glasses or visor off long enough to put them back on or at least close them tight." Sheila gave him a smile.

That actually cheered Scott up, much to Kitty's surprise. "Actually, that really is great."

"You might even be able to force more energy through. It seems like that part of your brain regulates the energy of your optic blasts. So if it ever heals, you might actually become stronger," the scion said as she considered matters.

"That really is good, Scoot. Good work; Kitty, Sheila. Scott, I do think you should go rest for now."

All of the students headed out, laughing and patting on the back all the while.

* * *

It was about two weeks later that things _really_ heated up. Outside on the grounds, Toad and Jean Gray had a quick battle where he found out that telekinesis and a bit of pyrokinesis far outstripped his jumping ability and sticky tongue.

Even as Jean Gray was soon whisked off by a metal sphere after knocking out the leaping mutant, Scott was catching up to Xavier and Logan to depart for Hawaii and his brother. So when Rogue, Kitty, Kurt and Evan showed up to join the trip, they were disgruntled to hear the jet departing. Kurt showed up with a pile of beach equipment (umbrellas and coolers) last.

"Hey! I'm ready to parrrty!" he called out. The blue-furred mutant suddenly looked around frantically.

"They left us already. Maybe we should go to the beach on our own," Rogue grumped aloud.

"That's a groovy idea, Rogue. You go track your room mate down and I'll go find Jean. Just remember to avoid Storm," the younger teen said as he was already thinking about basking in the sun.

They young mutants all split up. Rogue checked their room first, then down in the electronics shop. It looked like Sheila was finished with her contraption, which meant she should head to the Danger Room control room. There was a program running, which confused the skunk-striped mutant.

So why couldn't she see Sheila in the room. Not having a better idea, she hit the personal address system and spoke into the microphone. "Uh, Sheila? Are you in there? Ah can't see-!"

A doorway opened in the air and Sheila stepped out. "Right here, Rogue!"

"Ah'll be damned... What was that?" Though it had looked slightly familiar.

"An adaption of Forge's dimension pocket. Basically a really safe place to put things. The professor is letting me store some dangerous artifacts in a pocket dimension and he's using it for some high security needs and a bolt-hole," the young blonde called up. "Is it time for supper?"

"Not quahte. Some of us are looking to go to the beach. Ah figured Ah'd drag you out of your funk." Rogue saw her try to conceal her distaste. "Staying here working on stuff ain't going to help your depression."

"Fine. Let me finish up here first." The door opened again in the air and she stepped back into replica of the Pantheon made of hard-light holograms.

Statues to all the Greco-Roman gods were set up, each carrying powerful Relics that Athena had given to her before vacating her doomed world. Classical items fit on many, though Herme's iPod was a bit whimsical. In the center of the rotunda sat the magical hearth-fire with a single coal from Hestia's own Hearth on Olympus.

It took quite a bit of legend to keep it burning, but Sheila was fine with that. Sacrifice like that showed she was alive and willing to give to her cause. She bowed to the large statue of Athena, then did a quick scan to make sure nothing was missing. With that, she stepped back out into the 'real world'.

* * *

"Come on! Lighten up! We're going to beach!" Kitty shouted out in Sheila's ear.

The demigoddess was crammed in between the two other girls in the back seat of the X-Van. Rogue was staring broodily out the left window while Kitty had claimed the right and was almost bouncing in excitement. Kurt was driving while Evan was in the shotgun position, jamming to the too loud music from the radio.

"Guys! Incoming!" Sheila shouted as she saw a flicker of Quicksilver along the ridge as they drove along the shore. She flipped into the back area of the van and opened a window.

The van screeched as it barely avoided the ground buckling beneath them. Avalanche was able to drive and use his powers, even with rolling his eyes back up and on his head.

"Two can play that game," Evan shouted out, sending spikes of bones smashing into the front of the Brotherhood's jeep, nearly sending it into the sand below.

"Come on! Run them off the road!" Toad cried out next to Avalanche

"Pipe down," Arachne sniped from the back of the jeep, ready to leap off and attack.

"I can't get a lock on the driver," Lady mastermind snarled out from the other side of the Blob who took up most of the rest of the back.

Quicksilver ran back in a blur. "There's a large outcrop just around the corner! Shake it down and collapse it in an avalanche!" he called out as he ran alongside.

The cliff face shook even as the road fractured. In a roar of crashing rock, the X-Van was cut off. Rogue stuck her head out the window and a huge burst of red optic energy reached out and blasted a path through the rocks. Kurt skidded the X-Van to a halt on the edge of the ocean-side road on the other side..

"Ewveryvone out!" he yelled.

"Well, so much for our ambush. Guess its time for a good old fashioned fight," Quicksilver said with a cocky grin. "This will be over in a split second." He blurred towards Evan, only to be blasted into the sky as Rogue used her own advanced reflexes to blast the ground right in front of his charge with the force of a concussion grenade.

"One down!" the power-absorbing mutant called out.

Kurt appeared above Lady Mastermind. "Time for two!" His Hawaiian shirt flapped in the sea breeze as he kicked out, but just missed.

"Speed of thought, fuzzball," the blonde mutant from the Brotherhood called out, inflicting psychosomatic wounds on him as he thought he was being attacked by a ferocious murder of crows.

Arachne was right behind her, kicking out with her black and white clad foot to finish knocking him out. So the foot that plowed into her own face loosened some of her teeth even as Sheila landed lightly on the ground from her own spin kick.

"Time to rock their world," Avalanche shouted as he sent a wave of sand at them with a stomp. The Blob was charging at Evan even as he created a polearm and then leaped over the super-heavy weight mutant.

Lady Mastermind finished taking out the dazed teleporter even as he struggled to his feet. "Guess I'm good to go," she cackled as her long hair blew in the wind.

Toad had been leaping at Kitty, trying to knock her down by body-checks or by his tongue. "I'm the man! Can't touch this!"

"Who wants to?" the youngest mutant cried out in revulsion as she kept phasing through him and the boulders at the edge of the sea.

"Come on, Blob!" Sheila called out at the edge of the Atlantic.

When he charged at her palms-flat like a massive sumo wrestler. So he was shocked when she blurred away. Suddenly he felt something pushing against his back moving him faster than he had ever traveled before. The massive figure went splashing hundreds of feet into the surf.

"He's out of it!"

Kitty was just phasing back into normal space when rocks that the Toad had accidentally loosened rained down on her, stunning her just long enough for him to snag her neck with his tongue and then slammed her into a rock and into unconsciousness.

"I-I won? I'm not a loser? Yeah, take that!" the deformed mutant called out.

"Man, this is looking bad," Evan shouted as he threw his bone-javelin at Avalanche, just clipping his armored helmet.

"Shouldn't have done that," the earth-controlling mutant shouted. He stomped the ground again, burying his opponent up to his neck. "And that's it! We're the winners." He didn't look totally happy as he saw Kitty unconscious as blood leaked out her scalp.

"Um, there's still some of us here on both sides. So you guys aren't making a bit of sense," Sheila said, looking confused.

"We've proven to Magneto that we're the future. And here's our rides," Avalanche said with a grin as silvery looking metal spheres flew down through the air.

"You're a real piece of work, Lance," the young demigoddess said with a quick glare. She waved her hand over to Kitty and Kurt, healing them of most of their serious bruises or concussions. "I thought Kitty was your friend?"

"That's why I didn't fight her. Duh." He tapped the side of his weird helmet he wore as if to point out his 'smarts'.

"Kitty, I think you should head back to the mansion and talk to Storm," the youngest blonde said.

"Ah get it. We'll be fine, all rahght?" Rogue called out.

Kitty just shook her head carefully as she headed over to free Evan from his sand-trap.

* * *

Gas started to hiss into the travelling sphere to knock out the X-Men, as Magneto did not trust them at all yet. So when they arrived, a mist floated out of the two X-Men's spheres while Lady Mastermind, Avalanche and the Toad stepped out of their non-gassed modules.

"Nice and pleasant hosts we have," Sheila said as she stepped out of the sphere, slipping her gas mask into her pocket. "Up an at 'em, Rogue." With a concentrated surge of her legend, she countered the poison still in her roommate's blood.

The blonde Brotherhood telepath frowned as she did not quite see what the girl had pocketed. "Lovely, Miss Stick is awake."

"Silence. This just proves that she is even more worthy," Magneto boomed out as he floated through the air. "I suggest you do not try to fight me here in my Asteroid M, the bastion of my power."

"We're here to hear your talk, Magneto," Rogue called out as she quickly remembered what had happened. "You were the one that set up these gladiator matches."

"And without warning us, mind you," the blonde X-Men noted snidely.

Magneto floated to the ground, causing the three Brotherhood members to back up. "I have brought you here to this bastion of mutant supremacy so that you may become the leaders of a new world. You have proven yourselves to be the strong and the capable that will be necessary to save us from being destroyed by humanity."

"And of course give humanity a mutant boogieman for them to rally against," Sheila remarked. "And I doubt you'd be able to tell the difference between fear of mutants and fear of you."

"They will be right to fear me," Magneto said sharply.

"Well, you are such a pleasant and nice fellow that they can't help hating you dictatorial imperatives." It was starting to be obvious to the young demigoddess that he was a fanatic about his cause.

"Humans fear what is different," Magneto growled. He waited for a second to see if the X-Men sniped back at him. "There are a few people already here. Scott and his brother. And your Professor."

That was when Scott Summers and his brother Alex Masters walked into the large room the spheres had dropped them off. Magneto floated up and through a tube. "Mingle for a bit," he ordered.

"Scott! Are you ahlright?" Rogue asked worriedly.

"Why wouldn't I be?" he asked in confusion.

"Because we all had to fight to be brought here, yo!" the Toad called out, waving to one of the few people he considered to be a friend.

"What? I just came with my brother to find out what Magneto wanted," he explained. "Oh, this is my brother Alex, guys."

"So these are the X-Men you were talking about?" the blonde surfer asked.

"Only Aegis and Rogue. Toad and Lady Mastermind are part of the Brotherhood which are a rival group," Scott explained as he pointed them out to his brother. "This base is amazing."

"Well, it's a little more high tech than the Brotherhood's home," Lady Mastermind said as she subtly tried to fix her hair.

"Yeah, looks really cool," Avalanche said. "How about we explore this place."

* * *

"Sabertooth?" Rogue called out as the huge mutant shambled up out of the shadows.

"Heh. Guess you guys won against your opponent," the bestial mutant said. "So you guys are the winners. Magneto wants to talk to you kids."

They followed him through the labyrinth of high tech corridors in the floating asteroid. The three members of the Brotherhood were looking around in awe, while the X-Men was checking the area out as a potential combat zone. In the next room were several high tech devices and several tubes. In two of them were Storm and Jean Grey.

Magneto floated down to the ground next to where Charles Xavier sat in his wheel chair.

"What is the meaning of this, Magneto?" the telepath demanded, sweat beading on his brow.

"Survival of the fittest Charles," Magneto remarked calmly. "We have the strongest of either of our students here to prepare to lead this new world."

Aegis had been looking around and two figures in tubes. "You know, imprisoning two of our friends isn't going to make you any friends here," the young scion said as she glared over at a wall.

"You are a very strange girl. To be able to see your friends through that wall..." Magneto said as he waved his hands and unveiled the captive Jean Gray and Storm in see-through tubes as the wall opened up like a massive garage door.

"So we are your prisoners, as you do not trust us at all. Even after 'winning' your contest," Xavier said even as he tried to bypass Magneto's telepathic defense.

"You have not seen the light of my purpose, Charles. I am merely being cautious. We are the vanguard of the new species, Homo Sapien Superior. Humanity will fear us and try to kill us, their new children to protect their outmoded ways, to keep their species in control of the planet. So I have gathered the best and brightest here to offer them power to see through the dark days when man fights mutant. Here on Asteroid X, I have created a device, my Genetic Enhancer, that will amplify our genetic potential using shards of the energy emitted from these gems of Cyttorak. In the past, primitives thought it magic, but the science of these gems will purify all of us." The red and purple wearing mutant pointed towards another wall. "Alex, this device will allow you and your brother to gain control of your powers, to remove from you the pain of its emergence."

The blond surfer-dude looked shocked as he unconsciously clenched his hands. "You can make it so my powers don't hurt me any more?"

"Indeed, everything about your powers will be amplified, improved... no, perfected as you evolve to a more perfect state! You, Scott, will never have to wear your visor and be able to look upon the world with new eyes. To see those things you... care for... without the prison of your ruby quartz glasses." Magneto's voice was seductive, powerful as he hit them with his targeted manipulations.

"You can cure my head injury?" Cyclops asked in shock.

"Yes, indeed."

"Sorry, you are going to subject us to some hairbrained energy and hope it evolves us? No way. How do we know it works?" the ruby-quartz glasses wearing mutant asked as he had a bout of common sense. "Why don't you use it on yourself?"

"I already have. But perhaps you want a visible demonstration? Sabertooth, enter into the Genetic Enhancer and be reborn as a perfect mutant, ready to lead the world into a new age!" the Master of Magnetism called out.

The bestial mutant nodded and then stepped into the vault-like entrance. Power built up as the generators revved to full power. Purple-white light flared inside. When he reappeared, he was larger and stronger. And a whole lot hairier.

Aegis and Rogue were both studying him, using the young demigoddesses' mystical ability to understand medical ailments while the remaining mutants from the Brotherhood looked very intrigued. There did not appear to be any problem with the infusion of energy.

"That's the sort of power that I need," Lady Mastermind said with naked avarice.

"Yeah, I'm no longer a Zero. I'm a winner and winners get the power," the Toad called out with a leering smile on his face.

"Exactly, Todd. And with that power..."

"I just want to control my powers," Alex Masters stated. The pain had been nearly crippling at times.

"Then step forward, Alex, and take the power that is your birthright," Magneto proclaimed loudly.

"Don't worry, Alex. I'm here with you," Cyclops said as he laid his hand on his brother's shoulder.

"And you can join him. I will prove to you that this power is for all of us here on Asteroid M."

Aegis pursed her lips. This was all a lot of posturing to prove that Magneto was top dog. He was building his own group of super-powered people and nothing he had mentioned made her think that he had any charitable thoughts for the innocent.

Both brothers headed into the device, the door closing behind them just as Professor X realized something. "Scott! No! It does something to your mind!"

"That is enough out of you," Magneto stated coldly as the cripple's wheel chair was magnetically shoved beneath a third of the seven tubes, sealing him away. "They will be pure in purpose, to see the way of mutant leading the world and protecting us against the human aggression."

"Scott!" Jean shouted out, trying to reach her long time friend.

"So that's the way of it? Brainwashing so that people really don't have a choice? Which means you are just wanting brainless soldiers," Aegis realized while talking out loud. "We aren't the leaders of your Mutant Nation, we are your cannon-fodder."

"What?" Lady Mastermind asked in an outraged voice. "I'm no one's slave!"

"Not at all, I am just... adjusting people to see things in a more favorable light-" Magneto started to protest.

"X-Men! Brotherhood! Attack!" the young demigoddess ordered with a voice that nearly demanded that they fall in.

"Yo, man! Not going to let you take what little mind I have!" the Toad called out as he bounded forward, lashing out with his tongue that was blocked by a pipe.

"Fry, you bastard," the illusionist shouted as she tried to affect Magneto mentally. "I won't let you mess with me like my father! Wait, why isn't it working?"

"Um, uh oh," Avalanche said worriedly.

"I am above your paltry mind powers," the Master of Magnetism explained even as he floated up into the air again.

Rogue used Cyclop's optic beams, smashing open the three tubes and released Storm, Jean Gray and Professor X.

"Let's see if my powerup lets me rip you up," Sabertooth snarled as he leaped at the young figure in blue and white.

"Let's not and say we did and you failed again," she quipped as she spun away in a blur, faster than ever.

The device opened up, revealing Cyclops and Alex looking like they gained sixty pounds of pure muscle, though their hair had been turned white.

"This is what I wanted," Alex crowed as his hands glowed. "The power and strength without the pain!"

"I can really control my power! I'm healed!" Cyclops exclaimed in wonder.

"Cyclops! Scott! Magento is tricking you, the device brainwashes you!" Jean called out even as she floated into the air. Behind her Toad and Lady Mastermind were dodging Magneto while Rogue was blasting again.

"No, he's opened my mind," he argued back.

"I won't let you take my power away," Alex shouted out, blasting at Avalanche who had to duck. "I'm more powerful than you! You can't hurt me any more!"

Magneto heard an alarm, but was too busy fending off multiple mutants to respond as Storm joined the attack, lashing out with a lightning bolt. Outside in the air, a black stealth helicopter, the X-Velocity, was approaching rapidly.

"Can't this rust bucket go any faster?" Quicksilver complained to Wolverine from his seat in the back between the X-Men Shadowcat, Spyke and Nightcrawler, while the Brother members Arachne and the Blob filled the other seats.

"Pietro, shut up," Mystique snapped out.

"The X-Velocity can't rust, as it doesn't have any metal, so hold your britches, kid. We are nearly there. Unless you want to try to fly yourself to that?" Wolverine retorted over his co-pilot as Asteroid M hove into view ahead.

Nightcrawler whispered over to Arachne as she fiddled with the four-point seatbelt harness in her black and white uniform. "Is he always like this?"

"Obnoxious with a totally superior attitude? No, this is actually pretty mild," the redhead admitted. "I haven't seen him this angry before. I think he thought he had an in with Magneto."

The fuzzy ble elf started to laugh, which got him an angry glare from Quicksliver.

"Man, I hope auntie is okay," Spyke grumbled in frustration.

"I can't believe those guys leaving like that," Shadowcat complained.

"Pipe down back there, we are coming to a landing zone. I want everyone out and ready for combat instantly," the pilot called out as he wished he could flex his claws out.

The X-Velocity landed a little roughly on one of the many strange platforms of the huge asteroid and base.

Mystique led the younger students into the base, heading towards the sound of conflict.

Magneto frowned as he realized he was starting to be pushed back. "Enough. You are in the heart of my base, where everything I am is magnified. There is no way you can defeat me." With a wave of his hands, he blocked another lightning bolt and a crimson beam of energy.

Behind him, Alex and Cyclops were facing off against Jean Gray, the Toad and Lady Mastermind.

"Scott, you need to see the truth! Magneto just wants to use you! You don't brainwash people you want to lead. You train them and trust them," the red-head was arguing even as she used her telekinisis to barely block a crimson blast.

Lady Mastermind was trying to affect Alex with her mental illusions, but the brainwashing must have made him resistant. "No!" she screamed as white-hot plasma streaked towards her.

With a blur of motion in green and silver, she was suddenly snatched out of the way. "Hey, I can't let my favorite Brotherhood get vaporized. Luckily I'm just in time," Quicksilver said with a wide smirk on his face. "Of course, as fast as I am, I'm always on time!"

"Brotherhood, take Magneto down!" the shapeshifter and leader of the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants called out. She charged forward herself and try to leap and kick at him, only to be deflected casually by some magnetized debris.

"Mystique?" Rogue asked in surprise as her eyes stopped glowing red. "The other X-Men are here too!"

"Then let's really rumble!" Avalanche shouted, shaking the ground in a wave towards Sabertooth who was still trying to claw and scratch at Aegis. It sent the huge mutant flying while the demigoddess seemed to dance among the waves of rock and metal.

"Great, our allies are trying to kill us all by shaking the earth in a massive, artificially floating island of rock," she complained.

Explosions punctuated her statement as the mini-earthquake had broken something in the base.

"Um, oops." Avalanche really did not look that sorry, a smirk on his helmeted head.

Arachne sent out a wave of psychic webbing to stop some debris from falling on Professor X. "Sorry old guy, don't want your death on my conscious."

"I appreciate that. Unfortunately, I can not allow my student to rampage any further. Scott! You must come to your senses! Your will is your own! Focus on your friends, you family! Do you want to hurt those you care about?" The older, bald man ignored the one-sided fight to contact Cyclop's mind while ignoring the fight between Magneto and his three brainwashed followers and all the mutants. Magneto was still holding his own even so.

Cyclops grunted as he felt the intrusion into his mind. "Professor?"

"Bro? What's going on?" his white-haired brother asked.

"Child, watch your powers!" Storm ordered the earth-kinetic. "You could kill us all!" With that, she lashed out with a wind that knocked him from the ground.

Spyke charged over with a bone spear to try and skewer Sabertooth. "Let's get to the point here," the young, black skater shouted out with a grin on his face.

"You need to work on your snappy banter, kid," the bestial mutant snarled. He screamed as admantium claws ripped into his back.

"Good distraction, Spyke, but this is my fight!" Wolverine snarled as he tried to follow up the attack. So he was quite surprised when the yellow and brown garbed behemoth stood up and grabbed him with one clawed hand over his face and then threw him through a wall.

"Shrimp, I'm a lot stronger now! This fight will end with your death," he almost howled. "Raugh!" He leaped at the dazed figure, only to see his attacks go through harmlessly.

"Sorry, not happening stinky," Shadowcat called out as she phased Wolverine with her through a wall.

Sabertooth smashed right through it to chase down his hated nemesis. "Don't you dare run away, runt!"

"Father! How dare you discard me," Quicksilver shouted angrily as he spun a cyclone into existence under Magneto.

"You failed, again and again against Xavier's X-Men. My world has no room for failure," the older man stated coldly as metal pipes and wires lashed out, trying to entrap the super-speedster who was far, far to fast to be caught. "I grow tired of this battle. I offered you the world-"

"-as your slave, Magneto. You are nothing more than another despot using the power of mutants to set yourself up as ruler of the world," Aegis declared angrily as she appeared in a slightly slower blur. "You have convinced no one of your purpose here, but of your naked aggression," the demigoddess declared hotly as she appeared quite incensed by his actions.

The Toad and Arachne both had serious scowls on their faces. "You set us to attack other mutants and then try to control us?" the red-headed spider-themed heroine demanded.

The whole base suddenly shook.

"Hey Lance, quit that!" Lady Mastermind shouted as her long, blonde hair was whipped around by a wind.

"That wasn't me," Avalanche called out.

"It was me," Quicksilver said to the pair with some pieces of machinery in his hands. "Dad wants to toss me aside like... her... then he can reap what he sows-" The headstrong speedster's statement was cut off by an even bigger explosion that knocked him off his feet.

"It is time to abandon this place. X-Men! Brotherhood! Evacuate!" Storm called out in a strong voice even as she whipped out a wind to throw at Magneto.

Most of the Brotherhood headed to the strange metal globes that had brought them while Arachne and the Toad followed Shadowcat, Nightcrawler, Spyke and Professor X to the X-Velocity. On the other side of the battle, Storm still lashed out at Magneto; both unable to land a decisive blow while dodging attacks in the air.

Jean continued to confront Cyclops and his brother. "Scott, this place is starting to break up," she called out. "Come home with us!" As a piece of rubble fell from the ceiling, she quickly grabbed Alex and pulled him out of the way.

"You're right. God, I feel stupid," Scott said even as he ran over.

Mystique was dodging spinning saws of metal, but realized she was running out of time. Magneto could do this all day, even with fending off Storm. So she was quite surprised when one of the projectiles was blasted out of the air by an optic blast and the second one was intercepted by bouncing off the invulnerable Aegis.

"I hate to do this. My power should be used for healing," the young, blonde demigoddess said as she held out her hand and inflicted mystical wound with but a gesture.

"Aggh!" the master of Asteroid M. With a snarl, he hurtled a huge device at the girl, only to see her dodge.

Mystique was in the line of fire though and got clipped by the flying metal, sliding just barely into Genetic Enhancer.

"Mystique!" Rogue shouted, even as her eyes flared with Cyclop's power again. She missed as Magneto dodged in the air.

"Stay out of my Genetic Enhancer!" Magneto shouted at Mystique.

The shapeshifter had been thinking about rejoining the attack, but his panicked expression changed her mind. "Why thank you, I'll just help myself." The blue-skinned mutant dashed inside, even as another explosion rocked the asteroid.

With a snarl of anger, Magneto flew after her into device. Behind them the main room collapsed, cutting them off from the X-Velocity.

"We'll have to escape in the Blackbird," Storm ordered the remaining X-Men. "Cyclops, blast through that door there!"

Alex joined his brother, blasting through an armored door, even as the Genetic enhancer exploded. Everyone but Sheila charged out, even as she charged into the smoke and debris of the shattered device.

It was only a few minutes later that they came the black stealth jet.

"Where's Sheila?" Rogue suddenly asked. She turned back to head inside, when another explosion rocked the floating mounting as it started to lose altitude slowly.

"No time to go back! We will have to trust her invulnerability," the weather-controlling leader called out. "Everyone in the jet!"

Jean followed Scott and Alex into the back, while Rogue followed Storm into the cockpit. "She can still be crushed and suffocate," the skunk-haired girl said worriedly.

"Where as you can just die from a large rock hitting you." Storm ran the throttle up as fast as possible, sending the jet off the edge of the platform just before it would have slipped off. She struggled to control the vehicle as the ground rose up toward the at an alarming rate. "Hold on and brace for impact!"

Something impacted the middle of the Blackbird's wing, trying to counter its spin. Aegis grabbed the edge of the wing and tried to lift with all her strength and flight speed to keeps the plane from pancaking into the ground. With a roar, the engines finally were generating enough thrust and the stealth plane skimmed over the earth while picking up speed.

"There she is! She must have flown out and caught up to us," Rogue called out, looking out the window.

The floating base sprouted explosions even as more escape pods-spheres ejected even as the mountain fell the two miles to the earth on the North Pole with shattering force.

* * *

The X-Velocity and the Blackbird had landed back at the mansion and disgorged all of the mutants (and one lone demigoddess).

Arachne and the Toad looked on a bit uncomfortably as Professor X spoke with his team. "Scott, I am a bit disappointed that you fell for Magneto's control, but I'm glad to see that you recovered your senses."

"I'm sorry, Professor. But the temptation to be able to see the world without my glasses and wanting to be there for my brother..." the mutated X-Men started to say, only to let himself fade off as Professor X waved it away.

"No, Scott, I can understand. You are operating under a crippling injury. In fact, I'm probably the one person that can really understand you all too well. I admit I would be very tempted if someone offered to fix my back," Charles said in a soft tone.

"Why did you not follow us out, Sheila?" Storm asked carefully. If it wasn't a good reason, she would be quite upset.

The girl reached into the belt of her outfit, revealing several glowing red-pink stones. "Gems of Cyttorak. I figured leaving those behind would just allow Magneto to try this gambit later with other mutants. I'd rather not fight super-empowered mutants that have been brainwashed, thanks. Just brainwashed is probably bad enough." She was considering solutions to try and help Professor X _and_ Cyclops now. She wasn't quite powerful enough to heal them on her own and stem-cell treatments for regeneration were still years away. Perhaps a minor exoskeleton enhancement suit?

Wolvering, Storm and Professor X all shared a quick look of worry at that.

"Scott, you seem to be lahke fading a bit. Ah think that power up Magneto gave you is going to wear off in a week," Rogue suddenly said.

Sheila was suddenly focused on him and his brother Alex. "You're right, Rogue. That energy from the Genetic Enhancer is still in their system, amplifying their powers." The young demigoddess frowned. "Can you send a small blast out down the runway?"

With a shrug, the white-haired Cyclops blasted out with his optic blasts.

"Less than a week," Rogue decided. "Probably wears off faster the more you use it."

"Oh, that's _insidious_." At everyone's blank look (except Professor X's steady, hard gaze) she explained, "He gives you a temporary boost of power from his base only while imprinting a brainwashing mantra each time."

"That bastard," Toad shouted. "Man, he's real scum."

Arachne nodded even as she replied, "Yeah, he's no one to trust. Do you mind if I use your bathroom before we head out?"

"Let me show you it," Jean offered. "Scott, I'll see you later." With that, she led Arachne and the Toad up into the mansion.

"So I'm going to go back to normal? And have to wear my glasses?" Cyclops asked.

All of the other X-Men could feel for him as the young man realized that he was going to be trapped behind his glasses again.

"Cheer up, man!" Nightcrawler suddenly exclaimed. "You have the ability now, so make the best of it."

"She's right, bro. Besides, you told me that your head injury is getting treated. Maybe this will help you fix it faster," Alex said. "As for me, I'm going to wreak some havok and let loose some powers."

"Perhaps in a more controlled environment," the professor noted dryly. "This may actually assist you in adapting to your own powers, if you can remember the feeling."

"That's great."

Spyke, Shadowcat and Nightcrawler all took off to grab a snack.

Aegis played with the crystals in her hands for a moment. There was potential there. "Professor, we probably better try to get a hold of all of these crystals we can, otherwise what I took won't slow down Magneto at all."

"She's right, Chuck. That's going to be the first thing Magneto does," Wolverine stated with a growl. "I just hope it wears off of Sabertooth, too."

"It should, though it will probably take longer."


End file.
